In Search of Myself
by Nameless Dreamer
Summary: Xander’s life falls apart after the events of ‘The Zeppo’. And two years later, he must face his own demons to help save the world. *4/24* - Fixed the grammar and made it easier to read.
1. Questions and Insecurities

**In Search of Myself**

by Nameless Dreamer (as modified by Starway Man)

**Disclaimer: I own none of these characters, they all belong to Joss Whedon and the PTBs.******

**Email: vince92079@yahoo.com**

**Rating: PG-13.**

**Category: AU, Buffy/Angel crossover, Action-adventure.**

**Setting: This fanfic starts towards the end of 'The Zeppo' (S3), just after Jack disables the bomb.**

**Author's Notes: This is my first story. After lurking for months on the Net I figured I'd give writing a try. Any replies are greatly appreciated.**

4/24 – Starway Man was gracious enough to go through this for me and fix up the grammar and improve some scenes.  I have to say I'm very impressed with what he did.

**Acknowledgments: Credit to Psyche's Buffy Transcripts, I never would've been able to write this without them.**

**Summary: Xander's life falls apart after the events of 'The Zeppo'. And two years later, he must face his own demons to help save the world.**

"Without failure there can be no success"- John Washington Carver

**Part 1: Questions and Insecurities (set during BTVS season 3, 'The Zeppo') **

"I don't think I wanna be seeing you on campus anymore, Jack."

And with that, Xander Harris turned around and walked away. For a moment he could've sworn he heard the defeated psycho Jack O'Toole yell or scream, but at that point he didn't care.

It had been one hell of a night for Xander. He found it ironic that Buffy and the others didn't want him getting hurt, and yet he'd now gotten more involved with the Slayage activities than he had in weeks.

_And they'll never know...he mused to himself._

He was so deep in thought walking in the hallway towards the exit, that he didn't even notice one of the Sisterhood of Jhe demons coming through the entrance to the high school.

_Of course, Faith might blab about some of it, but that part might not be such a bad thing..._

The demon looked at Xander, and let out a loud growl.

_Man, I can't wait to see Cordy's face when she finds out...what was that? _

Xander looked up, and saw a demon with a very pissed-off look in its eyes and several bruises on its face.

It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out where he had seen it before; it was the demon he'd run over, saving Faith the vampire Slayer earlier that night. And now, it was a mere five feet in front of him.

"Ah, crap. Listen, about earlier, you're still not angry about that – are you? Can't we just let bygones be bygones here?"

The demon lunged at Xander. He just barely sidestepped it.

"Guess not..."

Seeing a clear path to the exit, Xander made a mad dash for the door. Just before he made it though, the demon caught up to him. It pulled him around and slashed at his forehead, and then punched him in the face.

The blow was so forceful, it knocked him to the ground. Xander could barely see, as blood from the gash on his forehead dripped into his eyes. He didn't even know where the demon was, much less where he could run.

Fortunately for him, he didn't have to.

Xander heard something coming toward him. The demon suddenly cried out in pain, and then all he heard was something hitting the ground.

The boy managed to wipe enough of the blood away, to see something large and deadly sticking out of the demon's torso.

"Xander!" 

It was Buffy Summers, the other Slayer, about 20 feet down the hall. She ran to him, and looked him over. Xander was hurt; his face was in bad shape. The blonde girl pulled a cloth out of her pocket, and tried to stop the bleeding from his forehead.

"Buffy? Where? How did you...?" Needless to say, with the battle going on in the library, he'd never expected anyone to find him until it was too late.

"I heard something, and when I came out I saw that thing giving you a dead body makeover. Let's get you to Giles. Can you walk?"

"I think so...just..." Xander got up, and walked into a locker. He still couldn't see very well. "Ouch!"

Buffy grabbed Xander by the hand. "C'mon, lemme help you."

***

Twenty minutes later in the charred war zone that was the remains of the library, Giles was bandaging Xander's forehead. Having washed out the blood in his eyes, the teenager saw what a pounding his fellow Scoobies had taken.

Shelves and books were thrown about all over the place. Everyone looked ragged; Willow Rosenberg, Xander's oldest friend, was slumped in a chair, looking like she was about to pass out from exhaustion.

Faith and Angel, the souled vamp who was technically a good guy, were in the corner. Their clothes were torn, and stained with blood.

Buffy was pacing back and forth behind Rupert Giles, her former Watcher, with a look of half-worry and half-anger at Xander.

Thankfully, the massive cut was only superficial and the bleeding soon stopped. Giles was finishing with the ad hoc medical treatment on Xander when he said, "There. How's that?"

"It's OK. Thanks, G-man. Well, with this cut I guess I can forget about my modeling aspirations, huh?"

The joke didn't help. The others were trying to figure why in God's name Xander was being this stupid. Buffy piped up first, exploding at the poor Zeppo.

"God, what were you thinking? Do you have any idea how lucky you were tonight?"

Xander instantly got defensive. "Wait a sec. Buffy, you're not gonna believe this but..." he never got to finish, as Buffy interrupted.

"No. No wisecracks. No excuses. No nothing! You nearly got yourself killed! We told you how many times to not get involved," Buffy threw her arms up in the air, "but noooo, you had to show up!"

What Buffy said next shocked Xander to the core.

"Xander, you can't keep doing this. If you got seriously hurt, or worse yet killed...look, you're just not cut out for this. I think you should stop helping us."

Giles felt it necessary to add his opinion; "I have to agree with Buffy on this, uh, perhaps it's for the best..."

Saying Xander was stunned was an understatement. After a taking a few seconds to let it sink in, the shocked expression on his face turned into an angry one.

"So that's it? You're kicking me out of the group permanently?!"

Willow got up from her chair and tried to console him, "Xander, we just don't want you getting hurt..."

It didn't work.

_They have got to be kidding! If it wasn't for me, that bomb would've killed everyone in here – and they won't even listen to my side of the story? __What, do they think I'm completely useless or something? I can't believe this!_

Buffy, Giles and Willow all made their wishes clear. Faith and Angel didn't, but the look on their faces showed a silent agreement with Buffy.

Xander knew then, that he couldn't win this argument.

"Fine. I get the picture." And with that, he got up and started to walk out

"Xander, you're in bad shape, maybe I should drive you home..." 

The boy pretended not to hear Giles. After that discussion, he wanted none of their pity.

Watching Xander storm out made Buffy look towards the floor, as if she were second-guessing her decision.

Angel came over to her, and put his hand on her shoulder. "You did the right thing. He'll understand that, sooner or later."

Buffy looked up at her beloved. "I hope so, I'd never forgive myself if something happened to him..."

***

The rest of the night, Xander spent in his room going over previous events. Like a scorecard in his mind, he was trying to prove to himself he did belong.

_What about the night the Master killed Buffy? Or the thing with the Judge? Well, there was that time with Ms. French – but that was at the beginning, so it doesn't really count..._

_I've been a part of this for 2 ½ years. They need me. Don't they?_

After hours of thinking things over and over again, he passed out on his bed. All Xander could dream about was Cordelia Chase, his vindictive ex-girlfriend, mocking him the day before:

_"It must be really hard when all your friends have, like, superpowers -- Slayer, werewolf, witches, vampires -- and you're, like, this little nothing. You must feel like Jimmy Olsen."_

_"Xander, you're the, the *useless* part of the group. You're the Zeppo."_

_"Right. Buffy needs your help. Can you say 'expendable'?"_

After waking up the next morning, Xander still felt like crap. This day was starting out as bad as the previous one.

_Even my own subconscious is against me..._

Only now, there was a massive bruise on his right jaw, to go along with the humiliation and rejection he was feeling. Xander desperately wanted to talk to somebody, even his folks.

But his Mom had already left for work, and he could tell his Dad hadn't come home last night. Again. Not that it surprised the young teen; it had been days since he'd last seen them, let alone tell them he was hurting.

"It figures. Is a hello or a how are you too much to ask?" the boy mumbled to himself, as he walked out the door.

Arriving at school, Xander made it a point to avoid Buffy and the others. He still needed time to blow off steam, and didn't feel like talking to the gang. He caught sight of them in front of the main entrance, so he went into school through the cafeteria door.

_So, now I'm avoiding my friends. Wait a minute...it's Thursday. Oh no, I have two tests today! __And I'm actually passing one of those classes! Ah, no...could my day get any worse?_

At that point, Murphy's Law decided to show Xander it could.

Principal Snyder appeared, and grabbed his arm. With a sneer on his face he barked, "My office. Now!"

***

"From the moment I first met you, Harris, I knew you were trouble. I just never figured you were so stupid as to try something like this..."

With that, Snyder took a videotape off his desk and put it in the VCR in his office. Xander was shocked to see the encounter between himself and Jack in the boiler room last night, playing back on the monitor.

It showed the confrontation, all the way up to Jack starting to leave the boiler room. The door flew open, and then the video went snowy. Much to Xander's dismay it was only video, no sound to vindicate him.

"The hidden camera was installed, because someone was stealing supplies from the basement. But I never expected this to occur! Needless to say, after I watched that fiasco I saw what was down there and I got the idea. The stuff you brought over last night was going to be used to detonate a bomb!"

Xander wasn't about to go down without a fight. "Now wait a sec! It was Jack..."

Snyder cut him off, "Yeah, yeah, O'Toole was part of this – but he's not here. You are. And I refuse to let you weasel your way outta this one, Harris. As of right now, you're expelled!"

_What?!_

The smirk on Snyder's face was too much to bear.

_How the hell did it come to this? Expelled? Plus nobody trusts me anymore, and since when does everyone I care about think they know what's best for me? What did I do to deserve this?_

Of course the troll that was Snyder wasn't finished, "At least, now everyone will know how much of a piece of trash you are! You'll never amount to anything after this, Harris."

That last line hit closer to home than Snyder ever imagined.

_So, they all think I'm worthless?_

At that point, something snapped in Xander Harris' mind. If they didn't want to care about his feelings, then he didn't want to care about any of theirs.

Not Buffy, or any of the others; he was so angry right now, they could all burn in Hell and he wouldn't care.

Xander was snapped out of his deep thoughts by more verbal abuse. "Nothing to say, Harris? No wiseass comments at last?"

All the anger of the last few days built up in Xander – and unluckily for Snyder, he was the closest person to lash out at.

"Fuck you!!"

With that, Xander threw a hard punch at Snyder. The ugly little troll fell to the ground, out like a light with blood dripping out of his nose.

After a few seconds, Xander took stock of his situation. He'd still be expelled, and now Snyder would also tack on an assault charge on top of that.

He doubted anyone would believe his side of the story; why would they, if even his so-called friends hadn't listened to him for days now?

In just 24 hours, everything he had worked so hard for had fallen apart like a house of cards. Was that all he was?

_No._

He could be his own man.

Without relying on anyone.

His mind was made up, but Xander knew he couldn't stay in Sunnydale anymore. He found it ironic that last night, he'd felt like he could beat anything, and now he had to run.

With that, the former Zeppo calmly walked out of Snyder's office and then out of the school. Cordelia saw him on the school grounds, and felt like throwing one more verbal jab at him.

"Oooh, look, it's Mr. Excitement. On another life-or-death doughnut mission, or are we just cruising for bimbos again, giving them lessons in lack of cool?"

Xander couldn't believe her; he just smiled as he walked by, wondering what he'd ever seen in the brunette bitch.

"What? What?"

But Xander just kept walking. He leaped into his uncle's convertible, and backed out of the parking lot. The music on the radio seemed to be the only thing that agreed with him, on his way out.

_I'm gonna run  
I'm gonna win  
I'm gonna do  
What I need to do  
'Cause it's time to be  
What I need to be  
It's time to be  
What I need to be_

_You can't tell me  
What to do anymore  
You can't tell me  
What to do anymore  
Now I'm free  
Now I'm free  
Now I'm free  
_

***

It was a sunny day, 68 degrees on March 12, 1999 at 8:47 a.m. – when the population of Sunnydale fell by one.


	2. Misperceptions

**Part 2: Misperceptions (set during BTVS season 3, between 'Bad Girls' and 'Consequences')  **

One Week Later

Had Xander stayed in Sunnydale, he would've learned word of him decking Snyder spread like wildfire. He earned the instant respect of some students and the everlasting jealousy of the others, for doing what they'd all wanted to do at some point.

A warrant had been put out for Xander's arrest, of course, but for all intents and purposes it was useless – as he was long gone.

As for Buffy and the other Scoobies, they heard of Xander's exploits from the night of the intended apocalypse and his subsequent expulsion the next day. Needless to say, all of them were speechless.

It was only after they'd all compared notes of that night, did they figure out Xander had been involved in something serious and had been seen several times asking for help. But they had no idea why, and it wasn't as if Snyder would tell them.

In fact, he had been making their lives very difficult after the incident, using association to his attacker as justification.

So, the Scoobies had started believing that maybe they'd been a little too harsh on their friend.

Buffy, Willow and Oz were all in the library after school, for Buffy's usual training regimen. They'd tried to cope with Xander's disappearance as best they could, mostly by trying not to think about it.

It was hard but it was the best they could do, as they couldn't even look for him because they didn't know where he'd gone.

Recent events aside, Buffy was still the Slayer and thus her responsibilities remained unchanged. However, Giles was late, very late, for reasons unknown to them and Buffy refused to listen to Wesley Wyndam-Pryce – her new Watcher, arrived from England – without him there.

The ex-Watcher finally did show up, almost an hour after school had ended. Wesley, assuming he was in charge, wasn't about to let this go without an explanation.

"Mr. Giles, perhaps you could tell us why you arrived just now?"

Rupert Giles walked past him and set his briefcase down on his desk; he then pulled a large manila envelope from it, and showed it to the others.

"I've been with my contact from the police department. Let's just say, I-I've borrowed the police file from Xander's...uh...incident...from last week."

The three teens suddenly dashed over to Giles, they knew any new leads to Xander's whereabouts brought them that much closer to finding him. The Brit then pulled out the videotape and the police report from that night.

Giles grabbed the tape and put it in the VCR, fumbling with the buttons as he tried to get the tape to play. The video footage started, but the frame kept jumping about no matter what he did. It was obvious he was having trouble.

"Giles, you're not one of those guys who can't program the time on his VCR, are you?" Buffy couldn't help but say.

"No...I mean...well...it's not like I ever use the bloody thing, what with me always being here helping you...I just never had the time to learn..."

Willow took pity on him, and got the balance working. It started with Jack setting up the bomb; some time later Xander arrived, and they started fighting.

Oz was reading out the interesting parts from the reports, as the tape played. "According to this, the evidence suggested materials to make a bomb were found at the scene."

Willow was watching the screen, while she got Oz's attention. The tape showed Xander staring down Jack, and forcing him to disable the bomb. She hit rewind, and showed that scene again. "Look at this."

While the others checked it out, Oz scanned farther down the report and found something interesting. 

"Says here, from the way Xander acted on the tape, he tried to stop Jack from setting off the bomb. Anyway, that's what the investigators have hypothesized. At the most, the police could've arrested Xander for being an accessory – but they decided against it, due to lack of any evidence besides the video. Jack's gone too, so there's no testimony from him."

The video finished just after Oz did. Giles looked up, and echoed what they were all thinking. "If that bomb had gone off, we, we would all probably be dead – and, and the Hellmouth would have remained permanently open..."

Giles took off his glasses, and rubbed his eyes. "So, uh, in effect Xander saved us all..."

It wasn't often that the Scoobies were lost for words. 

"He saved us. A-and we treated him so badly that night...what if something happens to him?" Willow was fighting off tears.

Buffy looked concerned at Willow. "No. He's all right, he has to be. We have to find Xander, and tell him we know what he did and that we're sorry. There has to be some way of knowing where he went!" she sounded pretty emotional.

Daniel 'Oz' Osborne finished with the report, and tossed it on the table. "His Uncle Rory's car was found abandoned at a gas station, 20 miles outside of Sunnydale six days ago. Ya know Buffy, when you left, Xander said you would show up when you wanted to be found. I think we just gotta hope Xander comes back in one piece."

"I'm afraid that probably won't happen..." Wesley injected. 

Buffy shot him a look that could have melted steel. Unfazed, Wes kept on, "...you have to remember – if Mr. Harris does come back, he'll still be charged with assault on Principal Snyder."

Deep down Buffy grudgingly admitted that he had a point, but that wasn't about to stop her. "We'll worry about that after we've found him. All right look, I'm going to look for leads on wherever Xander went. I'll meet back up with you guys at the Bronze, before Oz's band starts tonight. OK?"

"Sure."

"Right."

The Scoobies were fine with that, but Wesley wasn't used to a Slayer making up her own agenda. "Wait a second. What about patrolling tonight?"

"Ya know what? The vampires will still be there tomorrow. Goodbye, Wesley!" With that, she walked out of the library.

Wesley looked dumbfounded; the others just ignored him. Willow slung her backpack over her shoulder, and grabbed a large pile of books on the table, getting ready to leave.

Oz had a puzzled look on his face. "Will, what's with all that?"

"Oh, this? Snyder made me unload Xander's locker today."

Just then, one of the top books fell off; Oz picked it up, and noticed something fell out. It was a photo of Xander; chest puffed out, holding a large stuffed teddy bear in triumph. Oz had a frown on his face and held it up to Willow, with a look asking where it was from.

Willow looked at the photo, "Oh, that...that's from last summer. Xander won it for Cordelia, at the August festival."

"He looks pretty proud."

"Yeah, it cost him $12 before he finally won a game of ring toss." 

Oz put the photo on the top of the stack, and looked back at Willow. She still looked upset over Xander. "You gonna be alright?"

"Yeah, I just hafta do something for a little while, then I'll see you tonight."

Willow left out the part about that something being helping Cordelia's friend Anya, cast a spell to recover her mother's heirloom necklace. _He'd just get worried over nothing._

Oz had no reason to believe anything was wrong. "Cool, I'll see you then." They kissed, and he left.

***

Sometime later in an empty classroom, Willow and Anya were performing the spell the other girl needed to get her necklace back – and thus unknown to Willow, become the demon Anyanka again. Everything seemed to go all right, until they got to a certain point.

"Eryishon, hear my prayer."

Willow was suddenly flooded with visions from the alternate universe, that Cordelia had unwittingly created.

The Master killing Buffy, Angel being staked, dozens of innocent people held prisoner for food...

It was so intense Willow uncontrollably threw her hands up, and the bottle Anya was holding was knocked out of her hand, turning end over end.

Luckily for Anya, she managed to catch the bottle just before it hit the ground and poured the sand over the representation of the necklace. The spell ended just after that, then Willow jumped to her feet and looked at her spell partner.

"Wh-what was that?"

Anya was too busy sifting through the sand, looking for her necklace. "It's not here!"

Willow tried again, "Okay, that's a little blacker than I like my arts."

They starting arguing over the spell, and Willow refused to help Anya try again. The redhead then gathered her backpack and stack of books to leave.

"Fine, go! Idiot child."

Willow grabbed the chicken feet they'd used with her free hand. "I believe these chicken feet are mine. Look, m-magic is dangerous, Anya, i-it's not to be toyed with. Now if you'll excuse me, I have someone else's books to drop off."

Anya angrily smashed the plate they used for the spell. Since they were too busy fighting, neither of them noticed some of the sand had fallen on the picture of Xander with the teddy bear, when Willow had knocked the bottle out of Anya's hands.

***

In the abandoned warehouse, the vampire Xander from the alternate universe got up and noticed all the people and equipment had gone.

"What the hell?"

***

Later that night, Buffy was at the Bronze waiting for Oz and Willow. She was on her own at their table, in a bummed out mood. As nobody had any clue as to Xander's location.

She was surprised, there were quite a few vamps and demons that hated him and wanted nothing more than to find the young man alone without the Slayer. It made her feel worse, that now many of the things that hated Xander knew he was alone due to her inquires.

"Damn it, Xander! Where are you?" she said to nobody in particular.

Buffy then noticed in the corner of her eye, a senior named Percy West getting thrown halfway across the room onto a pool table. She saw the rear side of some guy in black leather pants and shirt, choking Percy on the pool table.

Buffy instinctively reached for the stake in her purse, grabbed the guy by the shoulder and pulled him around. Her jaw dropped when she saw who it was.

"Xander!"

VampXander stopped for a moment, and then realized the mortal enemy of all vampires was staring at him in shock. With hate in his voice he sneered, "You!"

Then he backhanded Buffy across the face, knocking her away to the ground. He knew by now this world wasn't right, and what he wanted was things to go back to the way they'd been. VampXander then stalked out of the Bronze, determined to find whoever or whatever had brought him here.

Buffy shook off the pain in her head. _Why did Xander do that? _

It suddenly occurred to her that maybe Xander was still angry with everyone, for being kicked out of the group. She ran out of the Bronze after him, hoping he would listen to her, but she couldn't find him anywhere.

Buffy knew she had to get to Giles; maybe he would know what to do. She ran to the high school, thinking of what she could say to her possibly former male friend.

***

When Buffy got to the library, she was surprised at the sight. VampXander was already there, with both his hands around Giles' throat. The demon had figured that since this White Hat was the source of all his problems back in his own world, he was behind them here as well.

Giles was against the wall; he managed to choke out "Buffy!" in between gasping for breaths.

Buffy ran up to the undead killer, and tried to pull him off without hurting him. She was pleading with him, "Xander, please, stop this!"

VampXander just threw Giles over the counter, and then turned to look at Buffy right in the eyes – with his game face on.

A million thoughts went through Buffy's mind; emotionally she was shocked and horrified, but VampXander didn't care.

He grabbed her neck and was ready to snap it, a sick repeat of what the Master would have done in the alternative universe; but all of a sudden, VampXander felt something pierce his back. He let go of Buffy, and pulled a dart out, leaving a little hole in his shirt.

Giles stood behind the counter, tranq gun at the ready. 

"Stupid English bastard, do you know how much this shirt cost!?" VampXander fell to his knees, and passed out as soon as he'd said that.

Buffy and Giles slowly walked over to the unconscious vampire. They had no way of knowing that this wasn't their close friend.

That this creature had been brought here against his will by a spell gone awry, from a universe where they were natural enemies.

All they saw, was someone they'd failed to protect.

The fact it was someone close to them, just made the proverbial knife twist harder in their guts.

"He's...he's a..." Buffy had trouble forming a coherent thought; painful emotions were running rampant through her. It was taking all her willpower not to have a breakdown, right then and there.

Giles hugged her, trying to make her feel better. He wasn't doing much better than her, though.

Buffy was still working on making herself feel worse. "This is all my fault. My fault...if I hadn't pushed him away...if I...oh, God...why does this happen to the people I care about?"

Angel suddenly burst into the library, oblivious as to what had just transpired. "Buffy, we got trouble! Some vampires have taken over the Bronze, Willow and Oz are stuck in there, and..."

He suddenly noticed someone was on the floor. "Xander! Are you-?" Then he realized what he was. "Oh, no..."

Buffy looked at Angel. "Why did I do it? I shouldn't have done it, I can't believe I was *that* stupid...!" Tears were running down Buffy's cheeks.

Angel stood there, trying to figure what they'd done wrong for Xander to end up like this; but he could understand Buffy's pain. He felt this was partially his fault too; after all, he'd sided with Buffy against Xander and pushed him away, just as much as everyone else.

A hundred years of guilt after being cursed with a soul, meant you never felt relief for all the horrors you'd done.

So, right now, he really could sympathize with Buffy and Giles.

But Angel was forced to push the anguish aside for the moment; it was easy actually, after doing it for a century. It wasn't forgotten and never gone, but he had to think clearly for all three of them.

If he didn't get Buffy to shake this off at least temporarily, then two more of her friends could end up like Xander – or worse.

"Buffy, listen to me! Willow and Oz need our help; they can't hide from those vampires forever. We have to go there now!"

"I can't just leave him! What if Xander wakes up? What if..."

"Buffy!" Giles cut her off and pointed toward the book cage, "We can put Xander in the cage for now, and he won't be able to get out from there."

He was thinking along the same lines as Angel now. If they waited any longer, more people at the Bronze could be killed.

Buffy managed to compose herself, and looked at Angel. He knew what he said next was crucial to Buffy's psyche, as she still wasn't totally with it. "Once we save the others, we can do something about Xander, OK?"

She nodded a few times. Giles and Angel helped her out of the school, determined to stop the Mayor's lackeys.

***

Ten minutes later, Cordelia stopped into the library to drop off some books. She found it strange Giles wasn't there. "Hello? Giles?"

"Hey, you." A pause. "Cordelia?"

"Hey me? Who do you..." She turned around, and saw Xander in the cage. "Oh my God! Xander! Where have you been all week?"

She ran over to the cage, trying to open it. Cordelia grabbed Giles' keys and was about to unlock it, when she stopped and looked at him.

"Wait. It occurred to me, we've never had the opportunity to talk. Ya know...with you all locked up." The Queen C attitude was rising to the fore. "Now what could we talk about? Oh, yeah! How about the ethics of cheating on your girlfriend?"

Several minutes later, Cordy was still talking, and VampXander looked totally spaced out. He was thinking, _If only I could stake myself..._

"And okay, it wasn't even like I was that attracted to you. It was more that we would get put in all these life-or-death situations, and that's all sexy and stuff."

_Swallow holy water..._

"I mean, I more-or-less knew you were a loser. But that doesn't make it okay for you to go cheat on me with Willow!"

_Burn to ashes from sunlight...anything, to stop hearing this..._

"Uh...Cordelia, I'm *very* sorry. I realize I was wrong. Now, could you let me outta here?"

"Yeah, yeah. I should just leave you in there, but you're lucky I'm a great humanitarian." With that, she unlocked the cage. VampXander stepped out, and smirked at Cordy.

"What? What's so funny?"

The undead demon put his game face on. "It's just, I never figured I'd get to be able to kill the same girl twice..."

Cordelia ran, screaming, out of the library. She kept looking behind her, and never saw Wesley walking toward her. She crashed into him, and fell to the floor.

VampXander waltzed up to the both of them, still with his game face on. "No more running."

Wesley got up in front of Cordelia, and put a wooden cross in VampXander's face. "Back! Creature of the night! Leave this place..."

VampXander winced at the cross, but he couldn't help but chuckle at this pathetic attempt to hold him off. "Oh, brother..."

He swiped at Wesley's hand, knocking the cross out it. A quick haymaker sent Wesley to the floor. The soulless vampire then pulled him up and pushed him against the locker, punching him in the ribs several times.

Cordelia looked up, and watched the demon beat Wesley to a living pulp. "Ready to die, English boy?" With that, VampXander sank his fangs into Wesley and began to feed.

The strange thing about people is that once you take away emotions like love and the ability to think clearly, only one thing remains. It's the same thing everyone instinctively feels, when threatened with fatal harm: survival.

Standing up, Cordelia felt that Xander would kill them both if she didn't do something. Thus acting on instinct, without thinking about it, she grabbed the cross Wesley had dropped and shoved it into the middle of VampXander's back.

The demon felt the blunt wooden cross pierce his heart. He let go of Wesley and turned to look at his assailant, before he exploded into ash.

"You bitch..." he managed to mutter, just prior to the dust flying.

Now that it was over, Cordelia suddenly realized what she'd done. Though she was upset over Xander being unfaithful to her, deep down he was still someone she'd cared about.

And now, she'd killed him.

All that was left, was a pile of dirty ashes.

Cordelia's face went pale and white. She took a few steps back, leaned against the lockers and slowly slumped to the ground. Her entire body was shaking, and then the teenage girl started staring off into space.

Wesley slowly managed to crawl over to her, and try to comfort and help her.

***

The others were heading back to the library, after rescuing the people at the Bronze. Thankfully, nobody had gotten seriously hurt. One problem down, now they were rushing back to the library to figure out a way of helping Xander.

Giles was going over options with Buffy, as they walked through the hallway. "Buffy, it could take a long time to find another Orb, and I-I don't know how we can keep Xander harmless until..."

He was still talking, as the five of them entered the library.

Problem was, Xander wasn't there in the cage.

Cordelia was in a chair, still catatonic and unchanged from earlier, with Wesley hovering around her helplessly. She looked at the others, and the tears in her eyes said everything they needed to know.

"...oh dear God."

Willow put her hand over mouth, and ran out. Oz went after her. Buffy's eyes started watering as she whispered, "No..."

***

The next day, the Scoobies were still devastated in all aspects of the term. Xander was dead, and they blamed themselves for it. People died in this fight, and everyone knew it, but never before had they been so directly the cause of death.

And with one of their best friends, no less.

There was no way any of them could fight anything, in their current state.

Faith hadn't witnessed the event, but when she learned the score the brunette Slayer was still shaken – for reasons she did not share with the others.

Even Wesley didn't try to prod them about keeping up the good fight, after all that had happened.

He had however, at Giles' urging, gotten the Council to fund the purchase of a headstone for Xander, claiming it was help the 'emotional stability' of the Slayer.

They all gathered by it in one of Sunnydale's cemeteries that night, and scattered VampXander's ashes on the green grass in front of the grave marker. The headstone read:

Alexander Harris

February 14, 1981 – March 19, 1999

He saved the world

***

Later that evening, they all tried to cope in their own way.

Willow and Oz were at the Bronze, sitting on a couch. The young Wicca's head was on Oz's shoulder, and her eyes were watering. The werewolf himself wasn't in much better shape.

Lifehouse was playing "Sick Cycle Carousel" on stage, but they didn't care. Both of them were staring off into space, oblivious to the rest of the world.

Willow then burst into tears, as the song began...

_If shame had a face I think it would kinda look like mine  
If it had a home would it be my eyes?  
Would you believe me if I said I'm tired of this?  
Well here we go now one more time  
_

Cordelia was in her room, going through her trash, trying to find a photo of Xander she hadn't cut up or burned. Unfortunately, she couldn't find any, and in a bout of anger the brunette girl kicked the trashcan viciously.

Then she saw it. The giant teddy bear on her bed; the one that Xander had won for her last year at the fair. Cordy grabbed it and held it tight, the only thing she had left of him, crying hopelessly.

_'Cause I tried to climb your steps. I tried to chase you down.  
I tried to see how low I could get down to the ground  
I tried to earn my way. I tried to change this mind  
You better believe that I tried to beat this  
_

Giles was in his apartment, with a shot of hard whiskey in his hand. He drained it, put down the glass, and was finally able to pick up the phone to do what he'd tried to do all day.

"Uh, hello, Mrs. Harris? I have some news about your son..."

_When will this end it goes on and on?  
Over and over and over again  
Keep spinning around I know that it won't stop  
Till I step down from this for good  
_

Buffy and Angel were at Xander's headstone, and the Slayer looked very upset.

Angel was behind her, with his hands on Buffy's shoulders. Both of them said nothing; they just stared at the marker, still trying to believe what had happened.

_I never thought I'd end up here I never  
Thought I'd be standing where I am  
I guess I kinda thought that it would be easier than this  
_

Buffy couldn't hold it in anymore. She just collapsed into Angel's arms, sobbing uncontrollably.

_I guess I was wrong  
_


	3. A New Purpose

**Part 3: A New Purpose (set during AtS season 1, 'War Zone') **

One Year Later

It was the middle of the night in L.A., during that March 19th of the year 2000. A girl started running down a dark alley, as she was being chased by several vampires. She came to a dead end, and the vampires moved in for the kill.

All of the sudden, the sound of a truck pulling up was heard. One of the vampires turned around, and realized they'd headed straight into a trap.

"You."

"You expectin' someone else?"

The human leader's name was Charles Gunn, and he was there along with several heavily armed teenagers. The vampires rushed the new arrivals, and a massive battle broke out.

Over the next few minutes Gunn beheaded one of the vamps, the stake gun on the truck also hit two and another was ganged up on by five of Gunn's friends.

While this was going on, the last vampire got to within arm's reach of Alonna and knocked her over. Gunn rushed to her defense, but this vampire was more experienced than his deceased comrades had been.

He ducked Gunn's sword swipe, then delivered a devastating roundhouse kick. Gunn took the kick in the head hard, and did a 180 spin to the ground, dropping his sword in the process.

The vampire stood over the disoriented Gunn for a moment, admiring his accomplishment.

He didn't realize however, that that was all the time one of Gunn's friends needed to stake him from behind. He crumbled into dust, that fell onto the black man.

Gunn coughed up some of the ashes he'd breathed in, and started dusting off his clothes. He looked up with a smirk, as his rescuer held a hand out to help him up.

"Your timing as always is impeccable," the bald young man grinned.

"What can I say? I'm just good like that."

Gunn's rescuer was Xander Harris; and a very changed Xander, at that. He was wearing black jeans and a dark green short-sleeved shirt, along with a black Raiders hat. His hair had also gotten longer in the last year and he'd grown a goatee.

"Right..." They both looked happy over the vamp's death, but as Gunn got up he suddenly figured out something was not right.

"Alonna..."

The two men both rushed over and helped her up, the concern apparent on both their faces. "You okay?"

Alonna rubbed the back of her head, and hugged Gunn. "Nothing a few Advil won't cure."

Xander looked at her, particularly upset. He wasn't about to let this go. "You know I hate it when you play the victim in these traps..."

Alonna stopped him in mid-sentence. She hugged him hard, then looked into his eyes. "Don't worry. Remember, first rule of huntin' vampires is don't get hurt. I didn't forget what you said."

She wrapped her arm around Xander's waist, and the young man put his arm around her neck as they walked back to the others.

Their comrades at the truck saw them and Bobby yelled out, "So, how'd you guys do?"

Gunn took the initiative and yelled, "Hey, Harris staked number thirty!"

Several of them started cheering, while an annoyed Chain handed a ten over to a grinning Bobby.

"Thirty bloods in three months. Heh, and Chain said you couldn't do it..." Gunn was obviously proud of his friend.

Xander didn't say anything; he just smiled and got into the truck with the others, as it headed back to the abandoned building they lived in.

Once there, the boy went off to the small room on the second floor that he used for a bedroom.

It wasn't much, most of the windows were broken or boarded up and the floor was concrete – but it was enough. He fell down on the mattress in the corner, exhausted from patrolling. 

Part of Xander still couldn't believe he'd really ended up here, even after spending all these months with Gunn's crew.

_Kinda ironic that no matter where I go, I end up fighting bogeymen..._

***

After the falling out in Sunnydale, Xander had ditched his uncle's car and wandered across California for weeks. To say the 'incident' had left him a broken man, didn't even begin to cover his feelings one bit.

It had felt like his 'friends' had ripped out a part of him, a part of his very soul that night.

Xander had been a broken shell of his former self after that. He'd trusted nobody, and Simon and Garfunkel would've been proud that their lyrics described Alexander Lavelle Harris to a T.

_I've built walls.  
A fortress deep and mighty.  
That none may penetrate.  
I have no need of friendship.  
Friendship causes pain.  
It's laughter and it's loving I disdain.  
I am a rock.  
I am an island.  
_

To others, he'd been quiet, emotionless and very cynical. The appearance of just wanting to be left alone. A lot of the people that had met him could tell something terrible had happened to this wanderer, but trying to push for it had only ended up receiving severe hostility from an angry young man.

Xander hadn't trusted people anymore; and sometimes, he'd wondered if he ever would again. Oh sure, there'd been a part of him that had still wanted to be the person he'd been before.

To have friends, a girlfriend, the thrill of adventure he'd felt in Sunnydale. It had been tempting too at times, but that part of him had become just a whisper by then.

Back then, the only thing that Xander had needed was money. He'd worked jobs as a migrant farmhand, in construction, manual labor, and countless other things. It hadn't mattered to Xander, as once he'd had enough money to leave a town he'd done so.

Hitchhiking across the state, the boy had done his best to keep a low profile because of the charges he knew he'd face if he crossed the police the wrong way. What he'd done that fateful night and morning after, was never far from his thoughts.

For that matter, neither were his old friends from Sunnydale.

Together, it had caused several sleepless nights and a lot of torment for Xander Harris. Somehow, some way though, he'd dealt with his situation as best he could.

Time had turned out to be the key for Xander's emotional recovery. After those first few turbulent weeks, he'd come to terms with his predicament.

He couldn't go back home, that was certain.

On the other hand however, there'd been nothing holding him back anymore. Xander had reminded himself he'd wanted to be his own man. And in front of him was a huge world he'd never seen, since he'd stayed in Sunnydale his entire life.

It had been time to experience California, and so he'd done that. He'd swung north, seeing all the major cities and everything else in between. He'd camped out in Yosemite under the stars, walked through Hearst Castle in San Simeon, and strolled along the walk of fame in Hollywood.

His self-imposed exile had turned into an impromptu journey of discovery. And slowly but surely during his travels, Xander had begun to heal. At that point he'd still been somewhat distrustful to others, but at least not fighting himself anymore.

Eventually Xander had taken the first steps towards filling the emptiness he'd brought with him, and the Zeppo had begun to believe in his own abilities again. With no one to hold him in check, for the first time in his life he'd truly felt free.

There were no parents, no Snyder, no Buffy nor Scoobies. It had been his time, with no strings attached. Doing the only thing he could do; living and enjoying his life.

He'd thought it was rather funny that that sounded like something Buffy might say; but that had been another time to Xander by then, almost a different life.

***

As for his current situation, Xander had just happened to be in the wrong place at the right time. 

After walking along the coast in Santa Monica and Venice Beach seven months previously, Xander had headed into L.A. and taken a job on the docks unloading ship cargo.

He'd opted for the night shifts, it had been better paying and he didn't have to deal with too many people.

One night after his shift ended, Xander had been walking back to the cheap motel he'd been staying at – when he'd come across Gunn's crew for the first time, just outside the docks.

It hadn't been a pretty sight; four vampires having their way with half a dozen of the teenagers, in a particularly brutal fight.

Xander had seen the kids weren't doing well. The vampires had divided up their bloodied opponents, and broken up the unit the crew had come in as. It had become just a fight for survival, for the young humans.

_Vampires? Here? What the...is the Hellmouth becoming a franchise?_

Now Xander hadn't exactly been friendly anymore to strangers after his life in Sunnydale, but then again he couldn't just watch several kids his own age get massacred...or worse.

He'd darted back into the closest dock warehouse and found what he wanted, an old wooden crate. One hard kick had broken off a jagged stake. He'd then grabbed it, and raced back into the fray.

Xander's advantage in this conflict had been surprise. The vampires, and the humans for that matter, had had no idea he was coming. He'd run up behind the closest vamp and effortlessly staked him, then done the same to the next closest bloodsucker.

Gunn's crew had then begun making a comeback, now that the odds had swung drastically in their favor. The last two vampires had then recognized their chances were getting slim.

One had seemed to defer to the other, the vamp they would later find out was Knox, the leader of the local nest in the area.

"Next time, there won't be any last second rescues..." Knox had then turned at Xander. "...and whoever you are, I'll enjoy sucking you dry after I hunt you down."

_Blah, blah, blah! Xander had chuckled. __How many times have I heard that? Good luck finding me numbnuts, I'll be gone tomorrow..._

Then Knox and his flunky were gone, leaving the street gang and Xander to themselves.

Xander had then starting walking backwards toward the shadows, about to copy Knox's disappearing act.

The Zeppo may have saved these kids, but that didn't mean he'd wanted to socialize.

But one of Gunn's crew, a pale-looking Irish kid had fallen to the ground a minute later from his injuries. The others had gathered around him to help, but he hadn't looked like he would make it.

Xander had heard them, and surveyed the actions taking place for a moment. Maybe it had been that overwhelming need to belong that everybody feels at some point, or maybe Xander had just felt sorry for the kid.

Either way, he'd made a fateful decision that altered that path he was journeying on: he'd decided to help these kids out. 

Rushing up to that group of strangers, he'd started barking out orders and giving the kid rudimentary first aid.

Xander had later been somewhat surprised he was capable of taking command like that, but what was even more surprising was that Gunn's crew had even listened to him. It was almost as if they'd known their friend's life lay in this stranger's hands.

That Halloween as Soldier Guy was possibly one of the best things that had ever happened to Xander. The information he'd learned on that night was priceless, even though he'd forgotten most of it when the spell had worn off and time marched on.

Sure he wasn't on par with a Navy SeAL, not by a long shot; but useful things like medical treatment, fighting, using weapons and taking charge of critical situations had still hovered around the edge of Xander's mind, making themselves available at times like that.

"Keep putting pressure on the wound to stop the bleeding."

"Here, tie the knot on the sling like this."

"We have to set his broken arm, or it's gonna be permanently useless."

Together, Xander and the rest of Gunn's crew had been able to get their fallen comrade back to the abandoned building the kids lived in.

And it took awhile, but they'd managed to stabilize the dying boy.

He'd made it, though he wouldn't fight creatures of the night again anytime soon. There'd been a look of relief on everybody's face, as they hovered around their recovering friend.

Xander had looked at them from the other side of the room, unnoticed by all, with the first genuine smile he'd had in a long time.

_Well, my work here is done. Exit, stage left!_

He'd started backing up toward the stairs, trying his Houdini impression a second time. Xander had just made it to the stairs before he heard her.

"Hey!"

An attractive black girl had noticed him trying to leave and ran towards him, getting the attention of others that saw the mysterious guy was trying to get away. "Why ya leavin'?"

_Damn! I was so close!_

"Well, ya see...I, uh...your friend...he'll be good as new...I mean...you don't need me here, so..." Several months of being alone meant Xander's people skills had been kinda rusty.

Gunn had walked up to the stuttering Xander looking grateful, and said, "Hey man, if weren't for you Shaun would be dead. We all would. Thanks."

Xander had just stared at him, still somewhat wary of these new people. Gunn had then held out his hand. "I'm Charles Gunn."

And after debating it for a second in his mind, Xander had shaken his hand.

"Xander Harris."

With a grin, Gunn had then pointed a thumb at the girl who'd caught Xander trying to slip out. "I see you've already met my sister, Alonna." She'd also shaken hands with a still uncomfortable Xander, who'd forced out a grin.

Gunn had known he was edgy. He couldn't blame Xander; the guy was alone with a group of so-called 'street thugs' in a damp, abandoned basement. "Hey man, why don't I drive you home? We can swap stories about killing vampires."

With almost no feeling Xander had responded, "I don't have a home."

"What do you mean?" came from a confused Alonna. She'd basically echoed what they all were thinking.

That small whisper for belonging in Xander's mind, had started demanding to be heard. Months of being alone had become too much to bear. He'd been so tired of nobody understanding what he had gone through.

If these kids had suffered through even a fraction of what he had...

_Could you understand? Would you throw me out like they did?_

"It's a long story..." 

And Xander hadn't disappointed. He'd spent most of the night telling them of his past. Of how he'd come from Sunnydale, a town built on top of a Hellmouth.

He'd spoken too of the arrival of the Slayer.

How several people had learned about her and helped her fight an untold number of evils.

All the unique and strange abilities everyone in the group had had. All of them, except himself.

He'd mentioned quickly how he'd single-handedly defused a bomb under their high school set by a psychotic group of zombies a year ago, saving the lives of his friends.

And how those same friends had all repaid him for it by kicking him out that very same night, because he was 'just normal'.

Finally, Xander had related his expulsion from school the next day, and the aimless wandering his life had taken ever since.

Some of the gang had passed out from exhaustion, while Xander told his story. But the vast majority of them were hanging onto every word he'd said.

Afterwards, they'd offered to let Xander stay with them for a while. And he'd agreed, although the young man had only expected to stay a short time.

_One night. I'll take it easy for one night, then I'll be on my way._

However, every time he'd tried to leave something had always kept him there, for some reason or another. One night had become two nights.

Then a week. Then a month.

Xander had soon learned the story of Gunn and his 'Lost Boys', as he liked to call them. A group of homeless kids with nowhere to go, who had starting living in this abandoned building. They'd been discovered by the group of vampires led by Knox, who'd started using them for food and entertainment.

As time went on, they'd gotten pushed further and further into a corner; and like any animal that got pushed too far, eventually these kids had decided to fight back. However, they weren't very experienced at vamp killing and they hadn't been able to do much up to that point.

After staying with them for a while, Xander had started going out with Gunn and the others to stop the vampires. As the young man had experience fighting these horrors, and it had showed.

He hadn't just fought; he'd covered other people's backs, defending comrades who'd gotten hurt and improvising on the spot.

It had soon become apparent that his experience made Xander just as good at this, as anyone else in the group. He'd also seemed to have this ability to sneak up on almost any opponent, like a hunter going for its prey.

The fact that he wasn't getting seriously hurt unlike others during these fights, had also soon caused other kids to seek him out for tips on fighting the undead.

They'd wanted to learn what he knew, everything that this new guy 'Harris' – as most people called him now – could show them. So, Xander had taught them what he could.

Combining what was left of his military training with what he'd learned from the Scoobies in Sunnydale, it had made a very significant difference to people who had no supernatural advantages.

The first thing Xander had made clear to the others was something Buffy had told him, which he'd changed around a little for these people; don't get hurt.

The former Zeppo had soon started getting respect from a lot of them, and was looked upon as a leader as much as Gunn was. For one thing, he hadn't tolerated kids who went off on their own with their 'I'm King Shit' attitude during fights.

Xander had made it clear when he taught them; they all needed to work as a team.

"You get hurt because you try to be a hotshot or don't watch the other guy's back, and they get hurt and you're not fighting anymore."

This had caused one or two problems, but he'd had the support of Gunn and several others. So things...had soon got sorted out.

Oddly enough, while the Scoobies had been determined to limit the exposure to evil for any normal people, Xander was the exact opposite.

If normal kids were willing to fight to the death to protect themselves and do their part, then as far as he was concerned they should be welcomed in with open arms.

The learning hadn't been just one-sided, however; for someone as immersed in isolation for so long as himself, these kids had showed Xander how to trust people again.

He'd made several new friends, and they'd given him a meaning in life that had been sorely lacking the previous few months. Xander and Gunn, for example, had quickly become best buds.

Not only that, but a lot of the girls there had taken a special interest in him. Ironically, the entire Sunnydale female population had considered him a loser, but here he'd been a greatly desired commodity.

And as for the war they'd fought, the results of Gunn and Xander's efforts had quickly paid off.

They might have been dropouts, orphans, runaways – it didn't matter. Under Xander and Gunn's leadership, they'd become capable fighters and those kids had come down on Knox's vampires like the wrath of God.

They'd broken the Master vampire's control over that section of L.A., and made it clear he wouldn't be able to regroup and try to build up his kind's numbers again.

Most importantly, the Lost Boys had lost only two people fighting in the last several months. 

Knox was still out there but they would survive, and Xander would be there to help them through it all.

***

"Hey! Earth to Xander!"

He was so deep in thought, the teenager hadn't even seen Alonna at the doorway to his room. It was dark, but he could tell it was her. Gunn and Alonna were the only two people here, that still called him by his first name.

"So...what were you thinking about?" the girl had a very curious look on her face.

Still staring at the ceiling Xander responded, "Just everything that's happened, the past few months."

"Yeah, a wandering guy finds a group of street kids and joins their mission to hunt vampires. Got all the makings for a great movie..." The light-hearted sarcasm was evident.

"Hey! You watch, Spielberg will call me back – and then we'll see who's laughing!"

Alonna laughed, and got onto the mattress with him. "Nah, then you'd be famous and everyone would want you. Here, you're all mine."

The two of them shared a very deep kiss after that. As with Gunn, Alonna had become very close with Xander. And about two months ago, they'd become something more than just friends.

She'd filled that last part of his soul, that had been missing within Xander.

He'd cared more about her more than anyone, by that point. They'd continued kissing, and made love that night.

And as they'd fallen asleep in each other's arms, Xander had felt more complete than ever before.

***

Xander Harris woke up the next morning around 10 a.m., with the sun shining into the room directly into his eyes – and with nothing but a bed sheet covering him. The way the building was, he could never sleep longer than that without the sun waking him up.

Alonna was already out of bed, probably in the basement. Xander got up and got dressed, then walked over to the far wall where a small mirror was hanging and combed his hair.

He stopped for a second, then pulled away the hair over his forehead to show a thin scar across the middle of it. Xander had gotten it the night Buffy had kicked him out, after the Sisterhood of Jhe demon had tried to rearrange his face.

Sometimes, it would remind Xander of what had taken place in his past. He'd be a liar if he said he didn't wonder what had happened in Sunnydale since then.

It was just curiosity though, not caring.

The teenager had all but closed that chapter in his life, but the curiosity was still there. So he went up to the small table in his room, and grabbed his cell phone.

He slowly dialed the number of his parents' house, but only got that annoying beeping noise and the recorded voice: "We're sorry, the number you have dialed has been disconnected..."

He tried the Sunnydale high school library, with the same results; of course, Xander had no idea that the place had been destroyed in a titanic battle with the Mayor, the previous year.

_Well, I tried. Not like I was going to chat. Just a "Hi. I'm still alive and I'm happy, so don't come looking for me." Whatever, Buffy and the others really don't care anymore..._

***

Xander let it go, and joined the other Lost Boys in the basement where he scavenged something for breakfast and found Alonna. They joined Gunn and Bobby watching 'Gilligan's Island' in the corner, and found the two were arguing over who would've ended up with Ginger Grant.

"I'm telling ya man, the Skipper was the biggest guy on the island! Ginger woulda wanted someone who was big."

Gunn wasn't intending to lose this argument, though. "You're full of it, Bobby. Ginger wouldn't have wanted someone like that. She liked guys with brains – she woulda ended up fallin' for the Professor, and lived happily ever after."

"Yeah, right. Like, you got no idea what women want, Gunn."

"And you do?"

Bobby put on a smug look, and puffed his chest out. Of course, nobody believed him. Xander and Alonna started laughing hysterically at this.

Bobby looked to Xander for support. "Hey, c'mon Harris, you know I'm right."

Xander put his hands up defensively, in between gasping for air from laughing. "Don't look at me, I ain't getting involved in this."

"Wha'? I thought you's always sayin' we's supposed to be a team!"

"When we're hunting vamps, sure. On this, you're on your own. Besides, it was Gilligan who belonged with Ginger."

Both Gunn and Bobby took offense at the Gilligan comment. They both got into why it wouldn't have been the first mate who'd have ended up with the movie star; but even then, they couldn't agree, and started arguing all over again.

Xander just kept laughing. He was happy here. He wasn't with a bunch of gifted heroes, trying to make them believe he belonged.

Here, he was among equals with no special abilities and they accepted him as an equal. Separated by distance and ideology from the original Scoobies, Xander was free to have formed a special bond with a new group of friends.

One that stood for what he'd believed in Sunnydale all along, that a normal person can make a difference.

However, one's future in the City of Angels is never certain. Like Xander, Charles Gunn had a destiny that would soon make life interesting for the Lost Boys.

And Xander Harris was about to learn that he couldn't leave something like what had happened in Sunnydale behind, without it catching up to him sooner or later.


	4. Unwanted Discovery

**Part 4: Unwanted Discovery (set during AtS season 1, 'War Zone') **

The Next Day

The commotion was obvious, as soon as Chain yelled "Incoming!"

The vampire he'd spotted landed right next to their building, and seemed to be waiting for someone.

Ironically, all the kids ran upstairs to see it as if it were a zoo animal, or a fight in the cafeteria. Xander didn't get up there until a minute or two later, and there were too many people blocking the windows for him to get a look at it.

He literally had to fight his way over to get a good view. And when he did, he wished he hadn't.

Xander couldn't see him all that well, but that voice was one he thought he'd never hear again – and it sent chills down his spine.

"Okay, so now I'm from around here. In fact, I'm moving in. Taking over, you understand me? I will dog you every night for the rest of your very short life, until you bring me what I want. Are we clear? Yeah. See you tomorrow."

_Deadboy? Here? And what did he want from that guy? Is it me?_

Paranoia was building up the questions in Xander's mind. He'd never expected to see any of the people he knew in Sunnydale ever again.

Chain and Gunn were to his left, passing judgment on Angel. "Vampire is movin' in, huh?"

"Yeah, well, he ain't gonna stay too long." Gunn was serious. If Angel came here tomorrow, chances were that he would probably go home in a Dustbuster.

_Not that it would be a bad thing...Xander thought to himself wryly._

***

Xander spent the rest of the day going over the previous night's events. Try as he might, he couldn't stop thinking about it.

And yet ironically, Xander couldn't bring himself to go out and kill Angel. A year ago, he would have been salivating at this chance to stake his favorite Deadboy.

After all, he had several dozen friends who looked up to him, and would only see Angel as just another vamp. Most importantly, Angel would have no idea they were coming.

Problem was, Xander had something else to think about. Killing Angel could bring attention to this place, from the others in Sunnydale.

And he didn't want them injecting themselves into his life again, especially to avenge Angel's death.

The thought of Buffy coming after him with a massive axe was both unwanted, and yet strangely appealing to him.

One weird fantasy aside though, Xander was happy here and didn't want to change that.

So, the former Zeppo compromised with himself. Since he'd been all over the state and near impossible to track, he came to the conclusion that Angel was only here by coincidence.

Granted, there wasn't a chance in Hell that he could stop Gunn from going after Angel, even if he'd wanted to. So Xander decided to hang back and just be there in a support capacity.

The last thing the boy wanted was his old rival to recognize him, and have some awkward questions thrown his way by all parties involved.

Xander had told the Lost Boys about his past, that was true, but he'd left out some things like everybody does when they tell stories. That included who exactly had been in the original Scoobies from Sunnydale.

If Angel died tonight, then so be it – but he wouldn't be the one who plunged the stake in. If he got away, well, Xander would try to get Gunn's focus off him and back to stopping Knox.

At that point, he would just cross his fingers and hope to God Angel didn't come back to this area.

The military schemer that was part of Xander's mind wasn't too thrilled with that last idea, but the young man had no other option to go with.

***

The ambush couldn't have been set better. Xander decided to watch this battle from the back of their pickup truck. He told his comrades he felt sick from something he ate earlier. He'd sit this one out, thanks for asking.

They had found the guy Deadboy had threatened last night, and all they were waiting for was Angel to show up.

After that, the vamp would soon have people coming at him from all sides. The only route of escape would be toward a warehouse lined with crossbow traps, trip wires and other nasty surprises.

The trap had been Gunn's idea, from a few months back; the man sometimes seemed to be a little too enthusiastic about putting vampires through that obstacle course from Hell.

In fact, sometimes Xander wondered if Gunn was related to Marquis de Sade.

Most of the Lost Boys called that death trap 'The Gauntlet', along with an old saying; 'Vamps go in, but they don't come out.'

Like clockwork the man of the hour appeared, much to Xander's dismay.

_No...damn it! __Why couldn't you have just stayed wherever the hell it was you came from?_

If he'd had any choice about it, Xander wouldn't have wanted this to happen – but it was now beyond his control.

Angel approached the man who he'd met with the night before. Xander couldn't hear anything, but he guessed it didn't go well when he saw a rather large demon attacking Angel.

Of course, Xander knew Angel better than this guy did, and wasn't too surprised when their intended target broke the demon's neck.

However, Angel looked pretty tired out from the fight. Just then, Gunn gave the signal and Angel suddenly found a rather large stake in his shoulder from the launcher on the truck.

_Bobby needs to work on his aim...Xander thought to himself, as he pulled his Raiders hat down to hide his face. Within seconds, several of his buddies rushed Angel._

But unlike Knox and his nest of cronies, Angel was a much more capable fighter that any vampire they'd previously faced. He managed to fight a few of them off, then retreated through the alley they'd left open and into the abandoned warehouse.

Angel was about to go through the meat grinder. But still...

After Angel ran into 'The Gauntlet', Gunn and several others followed him to make sure he didn't come out the way he came in. Xander grabbed the mini-crossbow in the truck and brought up the rear, figuring this would be how it ended.

He was expecting to see a pile of dust, but instead saw a surrounded Angel holding Alonna as a human shield.

Whatever hesitation Xander had had about this fight evaporated, as soon as he saw his girlfriend in harm's way. He instinctively aimed his crossbow at Angel.

_If you hurt her, so help me God..._

Since Xander was letting his emotions control him at this point, Gunn took control of the situation. "Don't fire!"

"What are you people playing at?" Angel seemed to realize these kids were playing for keeps.

"We're not playing."

"You're gonna get yourselves killed."

"We're gonna get *you* killed first!" Chain blurted out "Let's dust him."

But just as Angel let Alonna go, she fell over a trip wire and a crossbow fired.

Xander's heart stopped at that moment. But in a split-second Angel stuck his hand out, and the bolt embedded itself into his hand as he grunted in pain.

It suddenly occurred to Xander that this was his chance. He had a clear shot at Angel, and could end it right here right now.

His grip on the crossbow was so tight, he could've broken it in two. Sweat was pouring down his forehead, while Angel argued his case to Gunn. Xander wasn't listening to either of them; he was tuned out to the rest of the world.

All he could focus on was the target in front of him.

Xander wanted to fire, but he took into account the fact that Angel had saved Alonna's life when he'd blocked that crossbow bolt. The boy knew his conscience wouldn't let him live with it, if he killed Angel like this tonight.

_Go away, Angel. Just leave me alone..._

Very slowly, the young man lowered his weapon. There was no fight left in him for this battle. He did catch the tail end of Gunn and Angel's conversation, and it brought some relief that his best friend felt the same way about Deadboy.

"It don't matter why you're here, or what you are. If you ever show your face down here again, don't count on any long good-byes."

After Gunn's threats Xander had to get out of that room, his emotions were getting the best of him. The others followed him shortly thereafter. He grabbed ahold of Alonna and hugged her tightly, as soon as she walked out of there.

Nobody had gotten killed, Xander's identity was still unknown to Angel and he had been warned not to come back here.

It was the best he could hope for. Xander was just grateful the circumstances weren't worse than they easily could have been.

***

The next day was just like a continuation of the previous night. Everyone had their own opinion of this mysterious new vampire that they'd fought.

Most opinions were in the 'Stake him and get it over with' category. Still, there were some who felt like Angel deserved the benefit of the doubt. 

One of these was Alonna. She was debating this with Gunn, who disagreed with her views.

"I don't want to hear this."

"I'm saying he could be useful."

"The guy bugs me, Alonna."

"Everybody bugs you."

"You bug me the most."

"What? I'm trying to keep you alive. I'm not saying, trust him."

"It just don't play. I mean, if he's not looking to kill, what's he want? And why the hell would he come to a place like this?"

Now Xander had made it a point to stay the hell away from this argument. He'd had the same feelings Gunn did all those years ago, when Angel first appeared in Sunnydale. And he'd also voiced on several occasions that he didn't trust the souled vamp to Willow and Buffy, that first year.

Part of it was the fact that he was love-stricken with Buffy, but part of him had felt credence in his beliefs that 'a vamp is a vamp is a vamp', and nothing good would come of associating with Deadboy.

Still, Xander had lost that debate then and wasn't looking to rehash it now.

However, he felt he should come clean about Angel. The very sight of the souled vampire had put Xander on an emotional roller coaster last night, and it worried him.

For months now he'd thought he was in control, would he lose it again if Angel came to this place one more time? He had taken a leap of faith when he'd met Gunn, Alonna and the rest of the Lost Boys.

So, the young man decided to say something.

"There's something you need to know about him."

Xander was now about to take another leap. The others looked at him, almost shocked that their friend knew something about this guy.

"His name is Angel...and I knew him before this."

They all looked at him in stunned silence. It almost reminded Xander of the first night he'd met them all. That night he'd told them all about his past, and now he was filling them in on one of the untold chapters.

"He was in Sunnydale when I was there. Angel was part of the group that I fought with, alongside the Slayer. Yeah he's a vampire, but he's cursed with a human soul. He's got a guilty conscience and all that, so that's why he doesn't feed on people. As to why he's here, I couldn't tell you."

They all just stared at him, trying to process this new information given to them. Everyone in the basement was now looking at him. They didn't say anything after Xander finished, and he was starting to get worried.

A nervous look was on his face as he thought, _Don't just look at me! Say something!_

"He did something to you, didn't he?" Alonna started first, in what would probably be Twenty Questions.

She walked up to him, and could tell he was in pain just thinking about it.

After a moment Xander replied, "Angel was one of the people who...kicked me out of Sunnydale. I never thought I'd see him...or any of them, ever again. I didn't say anything before, because I didn't want him getting into my life again. And I thought you all wouldn't trust me if you found out..."

Xander took a deep breath; his hands were shaking. "When I saw him two nights ago for the first time in over a year, I got scared. I felt like he would tell you everything, and you wouldn't..."

"No!" Alonna stopped him. She had heard enough "I trust you, Xander. Nothing he says will ever change that."

"Same here!" One of the Lost Boys in the back didn't hesitate voicing his approval of one of their leaders.

Xander looked around the room. Kids were nodding and saying words of support.

There was no question about it. They trusted him. If they had to decide between someone they'd lived with and looked up to as a leader for months or a vampire they'd just met, it would be Xander every time. The former Zeppo looked gratefully toward all of them.

Just then Gunn put his finger up, wanting everybody to quiet down. It seemed like he was concentrating on something. "Get everybody out."

"What's going on?"

"Just do it!"

Smoke grenades came crashing through the window, right after Gunn finished talking. Most of the kids started to panic.

Xander and Alonna started herding everybody out of the building as fast as possible, while Gunn and Chain got ready to face down whoever was attacking them.

The former Zeppo worked on getting everybody out of there. There was traffic on the street where they were, so he paid no attention to the van that stopped behind him.

A moment later though, he was stomach-first down on the pavement after getting hit in the back of the head with a lead pipe. He then heard Alonna calling out for help.

"No! Help! Help! No! Xander! Gunn!"

"Alonna!"

Xander tried to ignore the pain without much success, but he did manage to roll over on his back and looked up to see Gunn chasing what looked to be two guys completely covered in leather and wearing gas masks.

Since cops didn't wear head-to-toe black leather, it was obvious they were vampires.

He tried to get to his feet, just as Gunn was knocked off the bumper of the van – but that blow to the head affected his balance, and he fell back to the ground.

The other kids helped him up, when a worried Gunn came up to him. "They got Alonna!"

"Was it Knox?"

"Who else could it be?"

***

Shortly thereafter, every one of the Lost Boys went back down to the basement and got ready for war. Anything that could be used as a weapon was grabbed by somebody. This would be their big stand, either they would stop Knox once and for all or die trying.

Xander was in the corner, working on sharpening stakes. His mind was on Alonna, and what she must be going through. He had to get her back, no matter what.

The young man was getting all his gear together, when James came back in from guarding the entrance. But he didn't walk into the room alone; Angel had James in a headlock, and dragged him in.

Xander's head was killing him from the attack earlier, and looking at Angel just made it feel worse. Angel looked straight at Gunn, who was on the opposite side of the room from Xander.

"You are going to get a lot of people killed," was all that the vampire said.

Gunn wasn't about to deal with this now. "You don't want to be here."

Xander tried to ignore Angel, but the vampire then said something that he took personally. "It doesn't have to be that way. Why can't we do this together?"

_Work together?!? Gee, pal, do you honestly think I'd believe that after you kicked me out for trying to help everyone in Sunnydale?_

Xander took off his Raiders hat, and threw it at the back of Angel's head. Angel turned around, and was instantly lost for words.

The souled vampire was shocked to see someone he'd thought was dead, not even ten feet from where he was standing.

"Why, you ask? Because you're nothing but a hypocrite, Deadboy!"

Then Gunn pulled away the tarp covering the broken window letting the sunlight into the basement, and Xander pushed Angel into an old meat locker.

"Now, you figure it out..." was all Xander said, before Gunn slammed the door shut on Angel.

Then the Lost Boys left; leaving Angel to try to come to terms with the shocking fact that Xander Harris was alive again.

***

The pickup truck pulled up to the building where the Lost Boys suspected Knox and his vampires had their nest. Xander, Gunn and the others came into a large open room from the entranceway. Gunn then turned around, and looked at the others.

"Hold up. Gimme ten minutes to check it out."

Xander looked at his best friend, "What if you're not back in ten?"

"Come on down, and kill anything that moves."

Just then Xander looked at the other end of the room, and saw several vampires approaching. Xander turned back to Gunn, "Go! We'll make sure they don't follow you."

Xander and Gunn shook hands, and Gunn went ahead to find Alonna. Xander turned and nodded to Bobby, who tossed him a sword.

Xander unsheathed it in his right hand and the other Lost Boys drew their own weapons, standing to both sides of their leader. Xander managed to make out how many opponents they had.

"Let's see...eight of us and four of them." 

Next to him, Chain lit up his flame-thrower and looked ready to kill. "Alright! I'm going barbecue myself some vamps!"

Xander turned and looked at his comrade, his head cocked to the side with a half-sarcastic, half-serious look. "Chain, you get trigger-happy with that again and I'll kick your ass from here to the other end of town!"

"What? Don't worry about me."

"Don't worry?!? Last time we let you use that thing, it took three weeks for my eyebrows to grow back!"

"Hey, trust me, Harris!"

"Right..." Xander mumbled to himself, as he launched himself into the fray.

The other kids followed close behind, with the vampires running toward them. Xander took a long swipe with his sword, as soon as the first vampire came close to him.

The vampire dodged it and swung at Xander, and the boy dodged his opponent's fist. They kept fighting like this, playing cat and mouse with each other, until the vampire grabbed Xander and threw him across the room.

The former Zeppo hit a pillar shoulder-first, and heard a popping noise come from it. His left shoulder was dislocated, and Xander grunted in pain.

The vampire moved in for the kill but Xander was able to side-step him, and swung his sword right into the vampire's stomach.

The young man subsequently pulled his sword across his opponent's abdomen, slicing it open, and the bloodsucker doubled over in pain. He then decapitated the undead killer, Highlander-style.

Xander was even almost tempted to yell, 'There can only be one!' 

As he watched it turn to dust Xander leaned against the pillar, dropped his sword and grabbed his shoulder in pain as he surveyed the battlefield.

There were two other piles of dust as the others roughly handled their portion of the fight, but Xander couldn't see the fourth vampire.

That was because it was charging at him, from the opposite side of where he was looking at.

Xander turned to see the thing rushing at him, and felt a wave of heat as Chain caught it with his flame-thrower. The creature burned to ash, just a few feet away from the young man.

"Yeah, man! I told you to trust me!"

Xander just stared at Chain with his mouth open, and a look of shock at him for a few seconds. He then got his composure back, and looked at the others. "C'mon, let's find Gunn."

Bobby voiced his objection, "But Harris, Gunn said ten minutes."

"Does it matter? He might need our help."

They ran downstairs to find several vampires, Gunn...and Angel. Xander burst in just as Angel staked Knox, and confronted the other vampires.

"So, do we have a truce? Or do you wanna die?" 

The vampires accepted this ultimatum, and started making their way out of the building. 

But Chain wasn't about to give up that easy. "Gunn, you came all this way, you're not gonna kill any vamps?"

Gunn just stared at Angel, "I already did." With that, he walked out of the room. 

Xander suddenly realized what he meant. _Alonna...oh God, no..._

The other dejected Lost Boys followed Gunn out, until it was just Xander and Angel in the room. Angel looked at the boy he'd thought had died over a year ago. "Xander?"

The former Zeppo just ignored him, and walked out with a doomed expression on his face.

***

The next night Gunn was talking to Angel, as they overlooked downtown L.A. "She was the reason, man. How come you do it? How come you're out here?"

"What else are we gonna do? I'll be around."  
"I don't need no help."

"I might." 

Angel looked down, and saw Xander walking down the street underneath them. He quickly ran down to the ground floor and started heading towards his...'friend', while trying to get the boy's attention.

"Xander! Hey, Xander!"

But the last thing Xander Harris wanted was to face this particular vampire.

His head still throbbed and his shoulder ached, but the boy had no choice. So he turned around, looked at him and with anger in his voice said, "What do you want?"

"What are you doing here? I mean...I thought you were dead," Angel was still trying to believe this was possible.

"Dead, huh? So you figured I wouldn't last away from Sunnydale. That I'd come crawling back, or end up in a gutter somewhere. Nice to know I inspire that kind of faith in you!"

"No, Xander, you don't understand. I saw you in Sunnydale – and you, you died!"

"Oh man, but I think you're really starting to lose it, Deadboy. After you and the others kicked me out, I left and never came back. I don't know what you were smoking to believe I was ever back there, but I've never set foot in Sunnydale after that! It's bad enough that I had to see you here in L.A.!"

"Oh come on! I helped you out here, those vampires would've..."

Xander cut him off, almost yelling at him, "Helped us?! We didn't need your help! I've been hunting that bastard for months and doing fine without you! Then you come in on your white horse, and think everything's okay now?"

"What are you saying?"

"It should have been one of us to get that prick! I've watched Knox hurt and maim people I care about. We should have been the ones to kill him! But no, you took that away from us, and now the girl I love is dead because of you!"

Angel looked stunned and a little upset that Xander would say that. "You can't blame me for that – I-I had nothing to do with it!"

"Really? 'Cause I'm thinking it's funny how this whole thing started, when you first showed up. And once again, you prove how worthless I can be when compared to the almighty Angel..."

Xander just hoped he'd made Angel feel just as bad as he did, when he'd been kicked out of the Scoobies. But he wasn't done yet. "Now that you've ruined my life a second time, if you know what's good for you, you'll just stay out of my way – permanently."

He turned to walk away, but Angel grabbed his arm. "Xander, please! Cordelia and the others, they're gonna wanna know..."

Xander stopped, and turned back around. He stood straight up, and looked Angel dead in the eyes. His face turned into an emotionless mask, but otherwise the boy looked ready to explode.

Angel was a little surprised by that; the Xander he'd known in Sunnydale would never have had the guts to do something so threatening.

"No. I don't want Cordelia or Buffy or Willow or any of them to know where I am! Get this through your head – if I ever find them here looking for me, I swear to God I will devote myself exclusively to hunting you down, and staking your undead ass! Just. Leave. Me. Alone!"

With that, Xander ended the conversation. Angel was lost for words, and could only watch him walk away.

The stunned vampire felt like this was indeed all his fault. He was one of the people who'd pushed Xander away, who'd caused him to run and brought him so much grief.

Angel could only wonder what he'd been through, after what had taken place the previous year. He could only imagine what could have changed the caring, energetic young kid he knew from Sunnydale, into this cold-blooded killer...

Xander just kept walking down the street away from Angel.

The young man felt completely worthless. He hadn't been able to protect Alonna, and had lost everything else from Sunnydale the year earlier.

_I never made it as a wise man  
I couldn't cut it as a poor man stealing  
Tired of living like a blind man  
I'm sick of sight without a sense of feeling  
And this is how you remind me   
Of what I really am  
This is how you remind me  
Of what I really am  
It's not like you to say sorry  
I was waiting on a different story  
This time I'm mistaken  
For handing you a heart worth breaking  
And I've been wrong, I've been down,  
To the bottom of every bottle  
These five words in my head  
Scream "are we having fun yet?"  
Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, no  
Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, no_

***

The next morning Angel was in his office, telling his story from the previous night to the one person Xander hadn't forbidden him to mention it to.

Wesley almost choked on his coffee. "You mean he's actually alive?" The ex-Watcher couldn't believe what Angel had just told him.

"Yup. He's living with those kids in the slums. I'm still coming to grips with it myself."

Wesley was still in denial, as he set his coffee cup down on his friend's desk. "But Angel, I was there. I saw the vampire get staked and become dust!"

Angel just sat on his desk, not trying to argue with that. "I know. I know. But it was still Xander, Deadboy wisecracks and all. I'm sure of it."

"Could he have come back somehow? I mean, there are ways. Spells and rituals to bring back a dead..."

"No. I mean – he, he told me he's never been back to Sunnydale. I can't explain what happened last year..."

Angel then remembered something else. "...and I forgot to tell Xander about the bomb! I forgot to tell him we found out about what he did the night the Hellmouth almost opened. God, I'm an idiot..."

Now Wesley looked concerned. "And you're keeping this from Cordelia and the others in Sunnydale? You do know she was utterly devastated after killing Xander. It took weeks, months for her to emotionally recover from that."

Angel was remorseful. "Ya know Wes, when I got my soul back, I didn't want to be bothered for almost 90 years..."

He was fighting back a lot of unwanted and bad memories as he finished, "...so we just have to hope Xander comes out of it by himself like I did, sooner or later."

Wesley deferred to his boss on this one. "Angel, I trust you, so I won't tell anyone. I just hope Cordelia doesn't find out..."

"Doesn't find out what?" Cordelia Chase was standing in the doorway, and had heard the last thing Wesley had said.

Angel's mind started racing, desperately trying to think of something to tell the brunette girl. "Uh...that...um...the stationery! Yeah, the pad you got with our business name on it, I spilled coffee on it earlier."

From behind his back, Angel knocked Wesley's cup over onto his desk.

Cordelia walked over to his desk, and picked up the gift she'd bought him. "Oh. Well, it wasn't that expensive, it can be replaced. For a second there, I thought it was something important..."

Wesley just looked at Angel as the vampire with a soul responded, "No, it was nothing."


	5. Recruitment

**Part 5: Recruitment (set during AtS season 2, 'Belonging') **

One Year Later

            In the middle of the night, Xander was sitting at the table in his room. The young man looked like he had definitely seen better days, on that evening of March 20th 2001. He turned on the lamp sitting on his table, and started writing a letter.

_Hey, pal._

_If you're reading this, it means I've gone. And before you ask, it wasn't because of anybody here. You and the others were the best groups of friends I've ever known. You gave me a place to stay and welcomed me with open arms, when nobody else would. But they always used to say nothing lasts forever, and so I guess my time here was just up._

_I know you've been splitting your time between us and helping Angel, Wesley and Cordelia over the last year, but listen – I don't blame you for helping them out. They're doing something important. I used to love being a part of that._

_Of course that's also the reason I had to leave Sunnydale, but if I had a choice I guess I wouldn't have traded it for anything. Sometimes, things just don't work out; I never wanted to face Angel and the others again, because I was afraid that all of those memories I buried would come flooding back._

_Hell, the last time I saw Angel I almost had a breakdown, remember?_

_Speaking of which, I heard Angel almost lost it and fired all three of you. You said he just wanted to be alone. Kinda strange, I can't stand the guy for what he did to me last year – but we seem to be more alike than I could have ever imagined._

_I noticed it was a year ago today when Alonna died. You haven't said much about it – but I know you better than that. You kept it to yourself, even though it must of tore you apart. If it's any consolation, I felt horrible too since she was just as important to me._

_God, I still miss her so much._

_Oh, sure, you've seen me with other girls since then. They were all hot, and claiming to be there for me to help me 'get over my loss'. Did I ever mention how much of a geek everyone considered me to be in high school? And yet here, all the girls who live in the neighborhood consider me grade A. Go figure..._

_Problem was, I never really connected with any of them like I did with Alonna. They were just there, and I guess I was hoping for a miracle. Looking back, I realize that Alonna really was my soulmate. We had so much in common, and she was always there to make me feel better. She made me feel like I could do anything in the world._

_But she's just part of my memories now, I guess. Did ya know, sometimes I wished I could just wipe my mind clean? Try to make a fresh start in life, without any burdens. Trust me, over the last few years – when it rained it poured, for whenever I got thrown a raw deal. I could be oblivious to the past and forget all the hellish things I've been through...that would be such a relief, at least for a while..._

Xander stopped writing and looked up, as every now and then whenever he thought about the past he always thought of Sunnydale. He could only guess at what was going on in the town built on the Hellmouth.

***

Meanwhile in Sunnydale, Glory the hellgod was in her apartment lying on her circular couch, and admiring her freshly-painted red nails. After a minute, she looked over to the side of the room and yelled out, "Oh, come on! It can't be that bad, lemme see!"

A few seconds later, someone walked into the room. The witch Amy Madison, wearing form-fitting black leather pants and a red halter-top, walked in.

She was also wearing a gold necklace with an onyx pendant.

Plus, Amy's outfit showed off her curves very well, and didn't leave much to the imagination.

Glory looked at her with a smile. "See! It isn't that bad. You look great! Why the glum face?"

Amy looked like she really didn't want to be there. "Ya know, I really like my own clothes..."

"Please! Your clothes are *so* 1998-ish. You're going to have to look somewhat fashionable around me, or else you'll just be dimming my spectacular beauty."

"That would be a damn shame," Amy muttered.

"What was that?"

"Umm...nothing."

Glory didn't believe that for a second. She reached into the front of her dress and pulled out her own necklace, an exact match to the one Amy was wearing. Glory wrapped her hand around it, and Amy's pendant suddenly starts glowing.

Amy's head jerked up as she screamed out in pain, while falling to her knees and wrapping her arms around her chest trying to dull the agony. And after a few seconds, Glory stopped and walked over to her hurting companion.

"Maybe it's time we went over the rules again. You work for me. You're here to make sure that redheaded bitch and her girlfriend don't cause any more problems for me. You do exactly as I say, when I say it, and you don't act ungrateful towards me! Comprende?"

As much as she'd hated to admit it, Glory had no real counter to the Slayer's pet witches. Falling 15 stories and making a six-foot crater in the ground had proved that, after Willow had used that teleportation spell on her in the hospital.

"You know, sooner or later they'll figure out I'm not in my cage," Amy still winced at the pain, as she struggled to get up.

Glory just waved her off, "Oh, please! They were so busy answering those snotty English idiots' questions the other week, they never even noticed. And if they did figure it out, what good does it do them?"

Amy just had a defeated look after that. Glory was right, what could they do? And what could she do, as long as she was still wearing this pendant? She'd tried pulling it off several times before, and had met with the same horrible pain every time.

Glory had Amy under her thumb, much to the witch's dismay.

Amy never got the chance to come up with an answer to her questions though, because just then the doors to Glory's apartment swung open.

Glory sniffed for a second, while a sneer formed on her face. "JYNX!"

The minion named Jynx came walking through the door, and his hands were up in front of his chest, in a 'please don't hurt me' supplication. "Oh most Magnificent of Magnificents, forgive me but we found this..." He didn't finish, because Glory grabbed his throat.

"You brought another filthy vampire here! First that idiot Billy Idol-wannabe, and now her! Tell me Jynx, why shouldn't I suck your meager brains out right here?"

But just then, Drusilla walked around the corner and into the apartment with a few of Glory's minions behind her. The female vamp was gazing off into her own world, as she walked in. "I saw it. It was beautiful, like a ball of great energy..."

She paused for a minute and smiled, "Miss Edith said you would like to know. She said you would help me show my lost Spike the way back to me..."

Amy wasn't too impressed, "Her? She tried to kill Buffy and the others three years ago. Failed miserably too, I might add! What's her name again? Druzilla?"

Dru shot her a nasty look, "Drusilla, you ugly rodent!"

Amy lunged at her, ready to rip out her hair. Dru did the same, but Glory's minions were able to get between them and prevent the potential catfight from happening.

"Enough!" Glory yelled, as she tried to take charge of the commotion. She put her hands on Dru's shoulders and turned her around, so it was just Glory in front of her. "Okay, dollface, now tell me what you saw – and this had better be worth it!"

Dru stared off into space again, "It was green. And swirling around. So pure. And so beautiful. It was such a delightful sight..."

Glory's face broke into a wicked grin. "Show me."

***

Xander was pacing back and forth in his room, trying to figure out what to put down next. After a few minutes, he sat back at the table and resumed writing.

_The strangest thing is, I didn't know what to do anymore. I haven't really for the past year. I've just been rolling with the punches, hoping to figure it out – but it never came to me. I didn't actually figure out a reason for doing this, either; guess you could say it found me._

The man put his pen down, and looked up. Remembering what had happened just a few hours before.

***

Xander Harris looked around the bar he was in. So the rumors were actually true! Several kids in the neighborhood had been telling him urban legends about a bar catering to demons for ages now.

'Caritas', it was called. Of course, Xander had shrugged them off as just that – legends – until Gunn confirmed the place really did exist. And at that point, Xander had to see it for himself.

Thankfully, Gunn had also mentioned the Karaoke bar was a safe haven for everyone. That was a good thing, since Xander was known as the guy who'd brought down Knox, even if it was Angel who'd finished him off.

And since Xander had pretty much perfected his ability to sneak up on or sneak out of almost anywhere over the last two years, he was pretty confident he could get out of the bar before trouble found him.

The young man spent most of the next hour sitting on a barstool, and trying to relax. There were two empty shot glasses in front of him, plus he was nursing a Bloody Mary; and basically, Xander was wondering what to do next.

Just then the guy running things, a green demon with horns wearing a bright red suit and orange cravat, came up to him. "Hey! You look new here. First time?"

Xander just nodded. Lorne looked him up and down; he'd seen this kid before, he was sure of it. The Deathwok clan demon just couldn't place him.

Then it came to him, this guy was in the auras of Angel and his crew. He snapped his fingers, and pointed at Xander.

"I remember now. You're Gunn's best friend. And you dated Cordy for a while too, right?"

Xander looked shocked. How did this demon know about that? "What, did Gunn tell you? Ah, man, I'm gonna kick his ass when I see him-!"

Lorne just shook his head, "Nah, beautiful, that ain't it. I read people's auras, and set them on the path they're supposed to be on when they sing. And you, you feature very prominently in Gunn's and Cordy's and...well, Angel's entire group. Hey, how's that scar on your forehead doing?"

Xander started getting defensive at this point, as Lorne was really beginning to freak him out. "Ah, you know, maybe I should get going. Yeah, it's nice here, but I'm just gonna take off..." the young man pulled a wad of bills out of his pocket to pay for his drinks.

Lorne looked upset, as Xander seemed to be an interesting person and the demon really wanted to read him. "What? Ah, come on. It's Xander, right? Look, it's still early. Tell you what, why don't you relax up on stage and sing a few notes? Drinks'll be on the house."

Lorne put his best smile on; if he weren't green, he probably could've been one hell of a salesman.

Xander wasn't buying it though, "I...I really couldn't, thanks anyways..." He got off his barstool, and started walking out.

Lorne just turned away from him and said, "Yeah, guess you're right. Besides Angel said you weren't a good singer, so what the hell..."

The vampire had never said that of course, but Lorne needed to stop Xander from leaving somehow.

The human stopped, turned around and walked back to the green demon with a ticked-off look on his face. "Deadboy said that about me?!"

Lorne figured he'd gauged that reaction about right.

Xander looked at the stage, then back at Lorne. "Fine. I'll show Angel who can't sing!"

The Host looked ecstatic, and slowly pulled Xander toward the stage. "Ah, you're gonna love it! I just updated the selection with a bunch of new songs. Go ahead, pick one."

Xander looked through the selection. Spending nearly two years with Gunn and the Lost Boys meant he knew just about every Rap song ever made, even if he didn't want to.

Of course, no rap was on this song list.

Finally, Xander just settled on something he'd heard on the radio quite a bit during the previous year. "Okay, this one."

Lorne got up and introduced him. Xander got onto the stage and up to the mike, while Lorne leaned against the bar and looked on.

Xander was so nervous, he could've vomited right there. He managed to calm himself down though, once the chords of music started. He waited for his cue, and started singing 'Everything You Want' by Vertical Horizon.

_Somewhere they're sleeping. It's already comin' in  
Oh and it's rising in the back of your mind  
You never could get it unless you were fed it  
And you're here and you don't know why.  
But under skinned knees and skid marks  
Past the places where you used to learn.  
You howl and listen. Listen and wait for the  
Echoes of angels that won't return.  
_

Lorne's jaw dropped. He was practically overwhelmed by the aura Xander gave off. He knew he'd been right in guessing there was something special about this kid.

Because if anyone had ever needed his help, it was this young man.

Still trying to take all it in, Lorne leaned back and yelled with uncertainty in his voice to the bartender, "Uh, Carlos! Find the strongest thing we got under there, and give it to me!"

Lorne looked back at this wayward soul, wondering if Xander would be able to understand what he would learn about his destiny.

_And you're waiting for someone  
To put you together  
You're waiting for someone to push you away.  
There's always another wound to discover  
There's always something more you wish he'd say  
_

Xander went into the second chorus, and started getting into this song. He'd actually started feeling a little better, for the first time in weeks. He went into the final part of the song and gave it all he had, determined to prove in his mind that he was a better singer than Angel was.

            Lorne, meanwhile, was on sensory overload. It was all a bit too much to take in. He groaned, then leaned back towards the bar again and yelled to Carlos, "Better make it a double!"

_I am everything you want  
I am everything you need  
I am everything inside of you that you wish you could be  
I say all the right things at exactly the right time  
But I mean nothing to you and I don't know why  
And I don't know why  
Why  
I don't know  
_

Xander got some decent applause. He was only an average singer, but the crowd could tell he'd given it his all. Not knowing what to do next, he walked back to Lorne at the bar.

"How was that?"

Lorne snapped out of the zombie state he'd been stuck in, after Xander asked him that. "Sit down. We need to talk!"

He waved toward a table nearby. After they sat down, Lorne told Xander what he saw.

Problem was, the Host was just a bit too excited after such a once-in-a-lifetime read, and starting babbling.

"I gotta tell ya something, kid. I thought Angel was the King of the Brood People, but now he may need to relinquish the throne! This last year, you've been doing almost nothing but wallow in your own self-pity."

Xander was getting a little peeved that this demon was comparing him to Deadboy. "Uh...this conversation have a point? Or are you just knocking what little pride I have down a few more notches?"

"Ah, right." Lorne took a big gulp of his drink and shivered a bit, after swallowing it. He then took a deep breath, trying to find the right thing to say.

"Look, what I do here in my club – it's sorta like this." He held up his left hand. "Most people are supposed to be here in life."

Lorne then held up his right hand, about six inches away from his left. "But for some reason or other, they're there. So it's my job, to put them back on the path they're supposed to be following." He then clapped his hands together, to emphasize the point.

"You, on the other hand..." Lorne fully outstretched his right arm, shaking his right hand to show where he saw Xander. "You're way over here! Best as I can tell, something happened to you two years ago that darn well shouldn't have..."

The Host took another deep breath. "Xander, sweetcakes, the thing is – you're not supposed to be here. You were never meant to wander all over California, and end up living in L.A. Yeesh, I don't think I've ever seen anyone go so far off his or her destined path! In fact, because of that – other events that were to have been related to you, they aren't happening now the way they were supposed to, either."

That speech hit Xander like a ton of bricks. It was quite possibly the last thing he'd ever expected to hear from Lorne.

The young man had expected this to be like reading a horoscope. 'Don't wear green on Friday; a Capricorn poses a potential love interest.' That kind of thing.

He'd never once thought about the last two years being a mistake that was his own fault.

Lorne had lit a proverbial powder keg under Xander, and so the vampire hunter exploded at the demon, "Hey, does *everything* have to be my fault? Every single thing that I'm involved in, is somehow blamed on me by you people! So, so, goodbye, Jolly Green demon guy!"

The human had had enough of this. He got out of his chair, but Lorne put his arm out to block Xander's path and pointed at his chair. "Sit. That wasn't what I meant, and you know it," the anagogic demon didn't sound too pleased.

To Lorne's surprise, Xander actually listened. "Sorry. It's just that every time something like this happens, it always blows up in my face..."

"No problem, kid. We all have our bad days, or years in your case..." Xander just shrugged and nodded in response.

"Okay, so from what I saw, you were never destined to leave your home town. See, there's this big old war going on in SunnyHell right now. You're supposed to be there, as you were destined to play a crucial part in it. And if our side loses, the whole world's gonna end..."

Going back to Sunnydale was, however, quite possibly the last thing Xander wanted to do in his whole life. "Hate to break it to you, but there's an outstanding warrant for my arrest there!"

Lorne didn't buy it. "Nice try sunshine, but the statue of limitations on assault is only two years. And from what I saw in Cordy's aura, Snyder's dead anyways, so you've got no excuses on that score."

It still looked like Xander wasn't convinced; so Lorne knew he needed to prod him more. "Xander, you left Sunnydale to be your own man. To find yourself, right? Well, I'm here to tell you what you need to do to be that man."

The demon looked serious. "You have to go back there. And prove to Buffy and all of the others, that you can be just as important as every last one of them. And you gotta go not next week, not next month – but right now, tonight!"

Lorne didn't pause. "And I can tell you this much, if you don't go back there and somehow the good guys still win, you're just going to fall deeper and deeper into this pit of depression that you're stuck in."

Xander looked stunned as the Host finished, "Until one day you decide you're just not cut out for this life anymore, and you quietly end it all. The ball's in your court now, kiddo, and what you do tonight will decide what kind of man you really are."

Over the past two years, Xander had forgotten why he had left Sunnydale in the first place. He'd been so involved with what he had here in L.A., he'd just completely lost sight of it.

Lorne had reminded him of what he'd really wanted to do, but Xander had changed a lot since then. So he didn't really know if he could go through with it.

"I don't know. Go back to Sunnydale, do a job, and I'll be done with it? With all of it? I...I need to think about this. Thanks for your help, Lorne..." The former Zeppo got up to leave.

But as Xander left Lorne said simply, "No Alexito, it's never that simple. When you go back, you'll find out the truth. I just hope it doesn't destroy you in the process..."

Lorne couldn't tell if Xander had heard him or not. And he didn't want to tell the human what he would face in his home town, because the demon was sure that the boy wouldn't go if he learned what was in store for him.

Xander had to be there, there was no other choice. This otherwise unassuming, unimportant, average young man had a destiny, and it was Lorne's job to make sure he followed through on it.

Lorne debated with himself whether to tell Angel about this little episode. Unfortunately, circumstances didn't let the Host follow up on that contemplation.

About ten minutes after Xander had left the club, Cordelia was in a library several miles away, along with Angel and Wesley. She started reading a passage from a book, and in Caritas a portal appeared – discharging a Drokken beast from the demon dimension called Pylea, right in the middle of the stage of Lorne's bar...

***

Xander tapped his pen on his table a few times. Then he looked back down, and kept writing.

_So, this is it. I've made my choice, and I'm at peace with my decision. I guess you could say I'm going to Hell. I just wanna say thanks again for everything you've done for me. And for not telling Cordy and the others you knew who and where I was._

_The rest of these guys look up to the two of us. Without me they'll need you here, so take care of them, man. You know that if it weren't for you guys, at the very least I would probably be a lot worse off than I am, and for that I'll always be grateful._

_Goodbye,_

_Xander_

Xander folded up the letter, put it in an envelope with the name 'Gunn' written on the front and left it under the light on his table. He then pulled his chair underneath the wooden beam, which was running horizontally above him.

The young man quickly took out his pocketknife, and started carving into the wood.

Now Xander was notorious in the neighborhood for loving comedy movies. American Pie (He always thought Michelle looked a lot like Willow), Spaceballs, Office Space.

He knew practically all of them by heart. But if the truth be told, Xander's favorite movie had to be one he'd seen just before he'd left Sunnydale; The Shawshank Redemption.

Satisfied with his work, and with a smile on his face the young man got off his chair, grabbed the duffel bag on his mattress and walked out. All the while, saying a line Morgan Freeman had said in his favorite movie.

"Get busy livin', or get busy dying."

On the wooden beam, the words 'Xander Was Here' were carved in for future generations to see.

***

Xander was in front of a storage garage, one that he'd rented out a few blocks from his residence. He was pretty sure he'd managed to slip out of the Lost Boys' building without anyone seeing him, as the last thing he needed was anybody trying to convince him not to leave.

His mind was made up. He would do what was needed in Sunnydale, and hopefully then be done with the place and its inhabitants once and for all.

Xander unlocked the garage and went in for what he needed, a red 1973 Ford Mustang Convertible – or Mona, as liked to call it.

He'd found it shortly after arriving in L.A. and meeting up with Gunn. The owner was a vampire he'd staked on a hunt, so he'd figured nobody would mind if he took it. 

It was a piece of crap, but Xander had spent a lot of time restoring it. He had always told Alonna that once he got it finished, they would drive down to Santa Monica together in it.

The worst part was that he'd managed to get the car fully restored, just before she'd died.

After that, he had left the car in here for almost a year, not wanting to see this reminder of the girl he'd cared about so much. Xander was just about to get behind the steering wheel, when he heard something landing in the back seat, scaring him half to death.

He turned around, and found himself face to face with Gunn. "Jesus...what're you doing here?"

Gunn held up Xander's letter. "I'm the only person in our group who knows what 'going to Hell' means. You may've been able to sneak out without the others knowing, but you didn't fool me. You're not that hard to follow, either. Huh, I actually snuck up on the stalker..."

Gunn smiled, "I'm kinda proud of myself, y'know?"

Xander was about to reply when Gunn cut him off, "Listen man, I know I've been spending way too much time with Angel and his people. And I know how much you hate it, despite what you wrote. So, maybe it's time I started acting like the best friend I'm supposed to be. Figured Rondell can take over for us here, for a while..."

They shook hands, and hugged – then the two best friends got into Xander's car. "So Xander, this pile of junk really gonna work?"

Xander turned the ignition, and heard the car purring. He smirked at Gunn with an 'I told you so' look.

Gunn just looked ahead, "Sunnydale, huh? Always did wanna start travelin' someday."

Xander then asked Gunn a serious question, "What about Angel?"

Gunn took out the pager he used with Angel Investigations, showed it to Xander and then threw it out of the car. "What about Angel?"

"Never mind, I guess..."

Xander pulled the car out of the garage, and they drove off. The young man was thankful that he would have somebody there supporting him for his reunion with the Scoobies. He still wasn't looking forward to that, but at least it would be a little bit easier.

***

In an empty Hyperion Hotel, the phone started ringing. After a few rings, the machine picked up and Cordelia's voice on the line was heard.

"Hi. Thank you for calling Angel Investigations. We can't come to the phone, but if you leave your name and number we'll get back to you as soon as possible."

After the beep, a distraught Buffy Summers started talking.

"Angel, it's me. There's something here in Sunnydale. A hellgod. She's more powerful than anything I've ever faced...and..."

The Slayer paused for a second, "...and I can't beat her by myself. Please, I need you here as soon as possible..."


	6. Lost and Found

**Part 6: Lost and Found (set during AtS season 2, 'Belonging') **

One Hour Later

            After what felt like ages when Xander and Gunn had left the garage, they were still in L.A. Truth be told, Xander had never traveled directly from Sunnydale to the City of Angels, and since Gunn had never visited the town built upon the Hellmouth – he had no idea how to get there either.

"I know I'm close to where we're supposed to be. The turnoff's around here somewhere..."

"Xander, this is the third time we've been at this red light! You and your shortcuts...by the time this apocalypse ends, we *might* find a way outta this city!"

Xander wasn't listening, though; he saw something going on about a block down the street. "Gunn, what is that?" he asked, pointing down to the right of the intersection they were at.

"I dunno. Can't really tell, it's too dark. You wanna check it out?"

Xander signaled and turned. The car crawled slowly, until they got a better look at just what was going on.

They could see two figures in the darkness. Xander tried to make out the people; one of them looked to be a girl, who was struggling or fighting something. "Gunn, I think that girl's getting mugged..."

The car kept crawling toward the disturbance. Hoping to scare off the attacker, Xander flipped on his high beams directly at them. 

That was when both men both noticed the attacker had blue skin and giant horns.

"Xander man, that ain't no mugger – that's a demon!"

Xander didn't reply verbally. He just slammed down on the accelerator, with grim determination on his face. To him, this demon was a deer caught in his headlights.

"Oh, shit...oh, shit..." a freaked-out Gunn frantically tried to buckle up, realizing then why the police said on TV to buckle up *before* you leave.

By the time the demon noticed something wrong, it was too late. It was slammed full on by two tons of steel, at 40 mph. The demon rolled about 10 feet away before lying in a motionless heap down the road.

The girl had managed to dive to the left of the car before Xander committed vehicular homicide, and currently was sprawled out as well.

Xander stopped the car and looked at Gunn, "Make sure that thing's dead. I'll check on the girl..."

Gunn reached into the back of the car and grabbed a sword, while Xander ran over to the demon's intended victim. When Xander got up to her, she was on all fours trying to catch her breath. Xander then suddenly realized he knew who she was.

"Faith?"

Upon hearing her name, the Slayer looked up and saw her rescuer. But once she figured out it was in fact Xander, a person whom she last knew as a vampire, her fighting instincts at once kicked in.

She punched Xander hard in the solar plexus, causing his diaphragm to collapse. 

Xander grunted in pain, as he staggered on his feet – he couldn't understand why Faith would attack him, but didn't try to follow that avenue of thought.

His mind was currently figuring out how to survive this battle in one piece.

Faith had gotten the drop on Xander though, and there was little doubt as to the outcome of this fight. After landing a few choice blows, Faith grabbed Xander by the throat and pinned him against his car.

She then pulled out a stake and raised it for the killing blow as she told him, "I don't know how you're still here, but I'm sending you back to wherever the hell you came fr-"

Faith instantly stopped talking, when she found a blade pressed up against her neck.

Gunn was to the side of her, with his sword against the Slayer's throat. He looked unwavering, ready to hurt her if she tried to hurt Xander. "What I think you're gonna do is that you're gonna get your hand off my friend. Then you're gonna take a step back, and act civilized. We clear on that?"

Faith slowly turned her head toward Gunn, not wanting him to slice it off. "You don't understand. He's a vampire!"

"Not...a...vam...pire!" Xander tried to get out in between gasps. That blow to his chest had knocked the wind out of him, and with Faith's hand clasped on his throat breathing was becoming a problem.

Using the hand wrapped around Xander's throat, Faith felt for a pulse and looked kind of confused when she found one. She let go of Xander and took two steps back, trying to figure out how this was possible.

"You're alive? But how? I mean, everyone told me..."

_First Angel says I'm dead, and now Faith? Xander interrupted her, not wanting to sit through another 'how are you still alive?' argument, "What is it with you people?!? Did you all go on some major acid trip after I left? I'm very *not* dead!"_

Gunn looked a little confused as to how Xander knew this complete stranger. "You two know each other?"

"Yeah, she was my first." Xander replied dryly.

"First? First wha-" Then, Gunn suddenly realized what he meant. "Ooooohhhhhhh. What, is she a ticked-off ex or somethin'?"

Xander rolled his eyes and looked at Gunn to do the introductions, "Charles Gunn..." he then pointed at Faith, "...meet Faith, the vampire Slayer."

"Wait a sec – you're Faith? *The* Faith? I kinda expected someone, you know..." Gunn raised his hand above his head, to indicate somebody much taller than himself. "...a lot bigger than you."

Faith just shrugged. "Sorry to disappoint. I'm not Chyna. Xander told you about me?"

Having never watched pro wrestling, the Chyna comment went over Gunn's head, so he just ignored it. "Well, actually no. Angel and the others did. But aren't you supposed to be in jail?"

Faith chuckled at that, "Funny story, actually. Since I was a model prisoner the last year, this idiot from the Council named Travers pulled some strings to get my sentence commuted to time already served. He'd tried to get Buffy back to working with the Tweed Men a bit earlier, but crashed and burned. So he tried to get me instead."

Xander could tell she was leaving something out, "So how long before you ditched him?"

Faith smiled, "Two days. I still fight the bad guys – just in my own way. So, Xander, how 'bout you? How'd you end up here?"

"Depends. You want the long or short version?"

"Short."

Xander took a deep breath, "Right. I left Sunnydale after I was expelled. I never went back either, despite what Deadboy might have said. I met up with Gunn and his friends in L.A., and I've been fighting vampires and demons in the area ever since."

The young man sighed. "And now...this green swami named Lorne said it was my destiny to go back to Sunnydale to help stop an apocalypse, so we're on our way back there, but..."

Xander lowered his head, and said something no male ever wants to say. "...we're lost."

Faith remembered Angel telling her about Lorne during one of his prison visits, "Lorne? Green demon with horns, right?" 

Xander just nodded at Faith's question. 

"Cool. That guy's advice is as good as gold. A big fight in Sunnydale? Oooh, there's no way I'm missin' that party. You are going to let me come, right?"

Xander and Gunn just looked at each other. This was certainly something they hadn't expected. Xander asked what they were both thinking, "If we said no, would it matter?"

"Probably not," was the reply they got from the Slayer.

With a very forced smile, Xander said, "Then I guess we got a new traveling buddy." He indicated the car, "Hop in."

Faith walked over to Xander's vintage Mustang and ran her fingers over the side of it, admiring Xander's new ride. "So tell me, boy toy, you gonna run over a demon every time we bump into each other or what?"

"Depends, are we going to have sex later?"

"HA!" Faith didn't hesitate to laugh her ass off at that question. Gunn followed suit, and also laughed at Xander's expense.

Xander groaned, "Guess not. So Xander, Gunn and Faith try to get to Sunnydale, Take Two. Let's go, guys."

***

About half a mile down the road, Xander and Gunn were waiting outside a 7/11. Faith walked out of the store, and held up a map of California.

"Cool. We're back in business..." Gunn grabbed the map and headed for the car, with Faith close behind.

Xander didn't budge though, he grabbed the Slayer's arm while Gunn kept walking. He needed to tell her something, without his best friend hearing him.

"Xander, what's wrong?"

The young man looked very serious, "Faith, look – truth is, I still haven't gotten over what happened that night before I left Sunnydale. Part of me still hasn't forgiven them, or you..."

Faith looked like she wanted to say something, but Xander kept going. "When we get back there, I'm not going to pretend it never happened. I'm going there to do a job, and then I'm leaving. If I have any choice in it, I'll be socializing with Buffy and the others as little as possible."

Faith couldn't believe Xander had just said that. From what little time she'd spent with him in Sunnydale back then, he'd seemed to be a witty, positive-minded kid who would've gone through Hell itself for his friends. "You're serious, aren't you?"

"Hell, yeah! And if what you and Angel say is true, they think I'm dead. They're not going to take me being there very well, not just because of that – but 'cause I left that life behind me a long time ago, Slay-gal. I'm a lot different now than I was then."

Xander hadn't slept in almost a day, and it was starting to show during this conversation. He looked like he might collapse from exhaustion right then and there.

But one thing was for sure, tired or not, nobody – not even a Slayer – could convince him to change his opinion about his former home and friends at this point.

Faith knew this was true. She could tell Xander had changed, just as she had. And if she'd known *this* was how he would've ended up in his life...the brunette Slayer was sure she would've said something that night, when they'd all agreed Xander should stay out of the conflicts in Sunnydale.

But Faith couldn't change the past, and the best she could do now was minimize the pain Xander would face when he confronted his ghosts.

"Alright, Xandman...I'll take that on board, and try not to pry." Faith knew she couldn't convince Xander otherwise, but she made a mental note to fill the young man in on all the developments in Sunnydale over the last two years during their ride.

At least that way, she could make sure he would know what to expect.

"Thanks, Faith..." Xander let go of her arm, and they went back to the car.

The three warriors drove off after that. The sun was beginning to come up, as they finally made it out of L.A.

None of them knew what to expect when they reached Sunnydale, but Faith said to herself what they all were thinking at that point.

"Hang on, B. We're coming..."


	7. Welcome to the Spiral

**Part 7: Welcome to the Spiral (set during BTVS season 5, 'Spiral') **

            It was mid-morning and after having had a quick breakfast at a diner on the highway, Xander, Gunn and Faith were back on the road towards Sunnydale. They were currently on a desert highway, making decent time toward their destination.

Xander was sound asleep in the front passenger seat. Since he hadn't slept in ages, the young man was getting some desperately needed rest.

Still, he'd managed to hold out just long enough to eat, and have Faith fill him in on what she knew had happened since he'd left Sunnydale.

The Slayer personally thought that he took it as well as anyone could have, considering everything that had happened.

Xander had already had some idea that the Scoobies thought he was dead; but Faith explained how a vampire duplicate of him had showed up in town almost immediately after he'd left, and the ramifications of that encounter.

Xander had shuddered and almost choked on his pancakes breakfast, when he found out Cordelia was the one who'd killed his look-alike. Aside from that though, he'd seemed to handle the other things – the Mayor's death, Faith's defection to the Dark Side of the Force, Buffy and Angel's breakup and Willow's current sexual orientation – rather well.

Faith did warn Xander however that she didn't know what had been going on since she'd ended up in jail a year ago, and to be ready for a possible shock or two from the Scoobies.

Since Xander was out like a light, Faith had started comparing stories with Gunn. She found it interesting that both of them considered Angel to be a sort of mentor in one way or another, but right now they were passing the time by airing Angel's dirty laundry.

"...so after the fight with Deevak, I find out Wes drove his motorcycle there – and made Angel wear a pink helmet."

Faith burst out laughing, "Oh, man. Gunn, tell me you have pictures of that!" 

"Nah, never thought of it. Took days after that, just to get the mental image outta my head..."

They just kept spilling the dirt on the poor vampire. Gunn was so busy talking he didn't even notice the small, jagged piece of metal in the road he ran over. 

Of course, he did figure out something was wrong when the car starting shaking and heaving.

He quickly pulled over, got out of the car and noticed the one of the big tires had huge, gaping holes in it.

"Ahhh! Son of a bitch!" Gunn yelled so loud, he woke up Xander.

Xander looked around and asked him, "What? Are we there yet?"

Gunn's face just had a guilty smile, as he tried to think of how best to tell Xander he'd broken his car...

***

Xander and Gunn were on Mona's passenger side, trying to change the flat tire; while Faith was on the other side of the road, with Xander's cell phone.

With the guys on the other side of the car and out of her line of sight, she was trying to call Buffy's house to warn the Scoobies of their impending arrival.

She'd tried before while Xander was sleeping, but only gotten the same result: the answering machine.

The Slayer then suddenly heard Xander yell, "Got it! Finally!" 

Faith quickly hit end on the phone muttering, "Damn it..."

She was trying to do this without Xander knowing. Faith wanted to soften the blow a bit for all sides involved, so she'd tried calling ahead. She could just imagine the Scoobies' reaction when a complete stranger, a formerly psychotic Slayer and a dead man walked into Buffy's house.

It almost sounded like a really twisted joke, the more Faith thought about it.

With the job complete, the three of them got back into the car. Xander decided to drive the rest of the way, not trusting Gunn with his beloved Mona anymore.

He started the car, "Okay, let's see if this has worked..." _Please please please please please work!_

Thankfully, the tire didn't fall off and they were on their way again. Their ad hoc repair seemed to be holding.

A couple minutes later, Gunn looked at his other two traveling companions and wondered, "Ya know, when we get there, just how we gonna find these people?"

Xander had never really thought of that, and coming up with an answer wasn't exactly easy. "I don't know, I figured we'd just head over to Buffy or Giles' place..."

But ironically, they didn't find the blonde Slayer and her friends. Buffy and the Scoobies found them.

Xander was zoning out sometime later, thinking of what he'd do in Sunnydale, when Faith yelled, "Xander, look out!"

He slammed down on the brakes, just missing an old RV going in the other direction.

An RV being chased by what looked to be several knights on horseback. On the top of it was Buffy, fighting several of the knights trying to get onto the moving vehicle.

Xander, Gunn and Faith just looked on with stunned expressions.

"Well, I don't think any of us expected that," Gunn deadpanned.

_Buffy always did know how to make an entrance, Xander thought to himself in a similar vein._

Xander turned around, in pursuit of the Scoobies. It wasn't that hard catching up to them, the RV was so old it couldn't outrun Xander's convertible. It seemed to be constantly swerving, trying to run down the knights without much success.

The real problem was the guys on horseback; and since they were attacking Buffy with weapons, they could be put in the 'bad guy' category without much mental effort.

A minute later, Xander and the others were trailing the knights. Faith tapped on Xander's arm from the back seat and pointed to one of the riders about ten feet in front of them, indicating she wanted him to get close.

Xander sped up, getting to within almost reaching distance of Faith's target. When the knight looked over his shoulder, he found himself on the receiving end of the Slayer's right cross.

The knight fell off his mount and slammed into the ground, motionless. While standing up in Xander's car, Faith grabbed the horse's reins and managed to leap onto it. She then grabbed the conveniently-placed crossbow attached to the saddle, and fired at the knight in front of her.

The crossbow bolt hit the knight's horse in the hind leg and it immediately fell in pain, sending the knight riding it flying over the animal. Faith got her horse to speed up; eventually trailing the RV on its rear left side, while yelling to get the driver's attention.

Some of the other knights, seeing their comrades in trouble, pulled off to confront Xander and Gunn. One of them got close to the right side of the car, swinging a mace at them.

Gunn ducked and Xander managed to pull the car to the left; the knight just missed Gunn, instead hitting the passenger door with his mace.

Xander wanted to cry, after hearing that weapon smashing up his poor car. _My paint job...you bastard! _

He jerked the wheel to the right, mimicking the RV's sideswipe attempt with better success. The car nailed the horse, and the knight tumbled into the back seat.

Gunn turned around and yelled, "No hitchhikers!" while punching the knight in the face, knocking him out of the car and into the path of another horse, which tripped over the knight. 

Realizing he had the advantage in terms of speed, Xander used his car to run interference in the knights' formation and his rearguard action seemed to succeed. The knights were scattered, and Xander's swerving was keeping them ineffective as a group.

***

Buffy was swinging an axe at anything that moved. She had already thrown several of the knights off the RV.

Some of them, the Slayer hoped, had to be dead. After all, how could anyone human survive being thrown off a moving vehicle with an axe embedded in his chest?

These knights certainly had barbaric means to achieve their goals. They were trying to hurt Dawn, but keeping her safe was all that mattered to the blonde.

It took awhile for her to notice the red convertible trailing the RV. Whoever they were, they seemed to be helping. She couldn't concentrate on the new arrivals with the knights trying to storm the RV, but she did finally get a good look at it and saw two guys sitting in the car.

 One was a black guy she'd never seen before, but the driver was someone she never thought she would see again...

"Xander...?"

***

"Giles!"

Rupert Giles was frantically trying to drive the RV while keeping the knights at bay, when he heard his name being called by someone outside. He looked to his left out the window, and saw what looked to be Faith riding a horse.

Giles lowered his glasses and rubbed his eyes for a second, figuring exhaustion was causing him to see things.

The rogue Slayer was still there when he looked again, though.

"Oh dear God. Willow!"

Willow hurried over to the driver's seat, and saw what Giles was pointing to. She was only slightly less surprised than the Watcher. "What's Faith doing here? Isn't she supposed to be in jail or something?"

"It's not just her," Giles responded. "There's a car trailing us, but I can't see who's in it..."

The driver's side mirror was shaking too much for them to see who exactly was in the car. Willow thought this was getting strange now, "Giles, is her being here a good thing?"

"Uh, well, I can't say..."

Riley was in the back of the RV, crouched below the windows with the other Scoobies and yelled, "Guys, what is it?"

Willow yelled back, "It's Faith!"

That got Riley Finn's attention.

The brunette had gotten involved in his relationship with Buffy, when she'd tried to switch bodies with the other Slayer the previous year. So Riley wasn't too happy hearing she was back.

But he didn't have any more time to think about that, because just then two knights came crashing through the windows trying to climb into the RV. Riley managed to grab one and throw him back out, before he could do any harm.

Tara knocked the other one out, after repeatedly hitting him with a frying pan.

"Faith's 'ere? This just keeps gettin' weirder 'n weirder," Spike mused aloud.

When the knights had tried coming through the window, Spike was forced to quickly move to a less sunny spot in the RV. Dawn was close behind and was trying to bandage Spike's bleeding hands, after he'd sliced them trying to hold a knight's sword in place in the ceiling of the RV.

***

The battle was raging outside the Scoobies' vehicle. Buffy, Faith, Xander and Gunn were doing everything possible to keep the knights from hurting the RV's occupants; however, no matter what they did, the attackers kept coming.

Finally, one of the knights got lucky. He managed to sneak up on Faith, and hit her over the head with the blunt end of a spear. She fell off her horse, and rolled a few times in the dirt.

Xander saw Faith get knocked off. He looked at Gunn, "We gotta go back for her!"

He said that, because Xander refused to leave anybody behind during a fight. Years of fighting with the Lost Boys had cemented that idea in his head.

If Buffy was still anything like when Xander had known her, he was almost sure she could hold off their attackers for a few minutes. He did a quick 180, and went back for the brunette Slayer.

The knight who attacked Faith would've disagreed with Xander's belief. As right after that, he threw his spear into the RV, impaling Giles in the side.

***

Faith hurt all over, and she knew her enhanced Slayer abilities were probably the only thing that had prevented her from being seriously hurt after tumbling off that horse.

Still, Faith's mind was telling her to get up. _Do NOT be a pussy, you've been through worse than this!_

She'd managed to stagger to her feet, when Xander and Gunn pulled up. The black man got out, and quickly helped Faith into the back. "You alright?"

Faith appreciated Gunn's concern, but she was more worried about Buffy and the others. "Are the others okay?"

"They were fine. They can handle themselves..."

Right after Gunn said that, the RV fell on its side, landing in a cloud of dust. Xander looked with wide-eyed shock, and then gunned it.

***

Xander's car made it to the RV a minute later, as the Scoobies were taking shelter in an abandoned gas station near their crashed ride. Xander's group was the last to make it to their destination; the knights had beaten them there, and were trying to storm the building.

Trying to kill Dawn.

The three warriors jumped out of the convertible, and rushed the occupied knights. Xander drew his sword, Gunn had his homemade axe and Faith...well, she was unarmed, but it wasn't like she needed weapons.

Since the knights were once again too preoccupied with trying to get at the Scoobies, several of the knights were badly hurt by the three of them.

Gunn looked around after a minute, and noticed they'd cleared out the front of the station. Faith and Xander ran up to him, after finishing off their opponents.

"Man, that was a little too easy...but at least, things can't get much worse than this..."

They heard something coming from behind them. The three of them all turned around at the same time, to see the knights lighting arrows from a fire in an oil drum about 50 feet away.

Xander and Faith just shot a dirty look at Gunn while he mumbled, "Yeah, I should never say that..."

They all ran like hell toward the gas station. Faith opened the door and rushed in, followed by Gunn. Xander ran through a second later, slamming the door shut just before the knights fired their arrows. He slumped against the door for a moment, while catching his breath.

***

As for the Scoobies, they were trying to hold their own in the station. Willow and Tara were tending to Giles, and Riley and Spike were doing their best to hold off the incoming knights.

"Willow!" Buffy yelled, when the arrows came flying in.

"I'm working on it!"

One of the knights came in through a broken window. From his markings, he looked to be important. Xander thought he was probably the commanding general of these knights, or maybe something similar.

"The Key," he said, and pointed his sword at Dawn.

_Key? What are you talking about? Xander didn't understand what this guy was babbling._

As for Buffy, she threw one of the weapons on the floor at the general, impaling him in the hand. A partial retribution for what his men had done to Giles. 

He lunged at Buffy but she sent him flying across the room, hitting a pillar headfirst.

Meanwhile, Willow and Tara were sitting on the floor with their legs crossed. "Enemies fly and fall!" Willow's eyes were black, as they chanted together. "Circling arms, raise a wall!"

They both raised their arms, and a force field was erected all around the gas station. Xander cautiously opened the door, and saw the knights were effectively shut out. He was also happy that his car was safely within the field's radius.

He closed the door and slumped down, while leaning against it in the shadows. _As if this is gonna be that easy..._

***

Now that they were safe for the moment, the Scoobies were able to focus on their mysterious benefactors. Faith was only a few feet away from the Sunnydale gang; and unluckily for her, just about every single one of the Scoobies had a bone to pick with the brunette Slayer.

"What the hell are you doing here?!" Willow demanded angrily.

"Hey, ease up a little Red. I'm here to help!" Faith had known when she'd tagged along with Xander and Gunn, that her old fighting buddies wouldn't want anything to do with her.

But that didn't stop her from wanting to talk things out...

"Thanks, but I don't think we need your 'help'. Go. Away..." was the Wicca's cold reply.

"Oh, come on – I was totally helping out a few minutes ago! You saw it B, back me up here – you know I'm right..."

Buffy didn't reply. She was too busy staring at the ghost from her past in front of her.

She was the only one of them who'd seen Xander during the fight. And the rest of them were too busy focusing on the rogue Slayer who'd tried to kill them the previous year, to realize Xander was there.

The blonde slowly walked over to him, saying nothing. Willow then noticed Xander lying there and almost lost it, completely forgetting about Faith.

Basically, the redhead's mouth fell open, and she looked to be on the verge of a nervous breakdown.

Tara tried to steady her and asked, "Sweetie, what is it?"

Willow just pointed at Xander. Tara knew who he was from photographs, but also knew from her lover that he'd supposedly died a long time ago.

Buffy walked over to him so Xander, for his part, stood up and decided to break the ice. "Hey, Buffy."

Buffy Summers just reached out and touched his face. Still not believing what her eyes were seeing. 

She then shook her head; all logic in her mind told her this wasn't possible. "No, no, this can't be right. You're not real..."

Xander wasn't about to argue this for the third time. He just pulled back his hair to show her the scar running across his forehead. "Uh, 'scuse me, but sure I'm real! Look, I dunno who this other guy was way back when, but that wasn't me. I mean I never came back to Sunnydale, after that night when the Hellmouth almost opened..."

Buffy was starting to believe this Xander might actually be real. She was still fixated on something, though. "How? I mean, how did you know where to find us?"

"I didn't. Guess you could say I was in the wrong place, at the right time..."

While this was going on, Dawn was making her way toward them. She had long ago admitted to Buffy, that she'd always had a schoolgirl crush on Xander.

And when he'd died, she'd taken it just as hard as everybody else had – maybe more. Dawn had tears streaming down her face when he saw her and she said timidly, "Xander?"

Xander just smiled, "Yeah, Dawnie. It's really me."

Instantly Dawn hugged Xander tightly, and a smile crept across his face. When she let go of him, Xander waved to the others, "Hey, Will. Giles."

Xander then noticed his best friend just sitting in the corner, trying to stay out of the limelight. The young man looked over at the Scoobies, "Guys, I want you to meet someone." He pointed to Gunn, "This is my best friend, Charles Gunn from L.A."

Gunn walked up to Buffy and held out his hand, "Nice to meet ya. I've heard a lot about you..."

Buffy shook his hand, trying to understand. Xander had said it without any special inflection in his voice and not trying to imply anything; but the last time Buffy and Willow checked, *they* were his best friends.

Spike, meanwhile, was completely ignoring this little love-fest. Smoking a cigarette was helping him to resist the urge to throw up, after seeing this ridiculous reunion...

"Uh, Slayer? Hate to interrupt, but whaddaya think we should do about them?" he nodded out the window toward the knights outside.

Buffy looked out the window, with Xander and Gunn behind her. "Will, how long will it hold?"

Willow looked uncertain, "Half a day, maybe. Or until Heckle and Jeckle punch a hole through it," indicating the monks chanting incoherently.

Xander looked at Gunn. "I say we take the fight to the enemy. We've seen worse, right Gunn? Remember that time in Walnut Park?"

Gunn replied nervously, "Oh, yeah. That was fun! Similar odds too, 'cept this time we got two Slayers on our team..."

Buffy was getting really worried at this point. She had no idea what to do next, and now Xander was planning to her what seemed like a suicide mission.

She had just gotten him back, and the young woman didn't want to lose him a second time, only a few minutes after finding out he was alive.

"No! Do you have any idea what you're saying? I don't want you getting hurt again!"

Xander just looked at her, not believing the blonde bitch had just said that. To him, she was acting just like how she had when he'd left. He had no idea of how much Buffy had changed, but to Xander's eyes it didn't look like much.

_No. Not again! I won't let you do this to me again..._

Two years ago, he'd stayed silent when Buffy had kicked him out of the Scoobies.

The former Zeppo knew he should've said something then, but he hadn't. And that night had changed his life for the worse, forever – almost destroying him.

"I. Don't. Believe. This!" Xander yelled simply.

He decided to use this abandoned gas station as his bully pulpit. It was two years too late to change things, but the boy didn't care.

Xander Harris refused to stay silent this time.

"Two years, and you haven't changed at all! Look, Slayer, I was sent here to help you – I didn't have any choice in the matter! Trust me – if I did, I wouldn't have come! And I didn't put my life on hold, just so I could play Jimmy Olsen or bury my face in a book for you!"

The shocked registered on Buffy's face. "Xander, that's not what I meant! Look, you're not..."

Xander interrupted her, as he wasn't finished. "Shut the hell up, and LISTEN to me for once in your life! Do you have ANY idea what you did to me that night? What ALL of you did to me?"

Xander was almost shaking with rage. "When you kicked me out, you ruined my life! My best friends told me to go away, because I was nothing but an impediment to the cause! And that nearly destroyed me! Do you wanna know how long it took me to trust another human being after that? Do you?! And now you're running away. You can't deal with whatever's happened, but you *still* don't want my help?!"

Xander threw his hands up in frustration. "I should have known better than this. Un-freaking-believable...!"

The young man stopped yelling, before he said something he might regret. Without saying another word, Xander then stormed out of the gas station.

Spike simply started smirking in amusement, truly having enjoyed the show.

Gunn only sighed, worried about his best friend's mental health.

Faith did nothing but look down, happy that everyone had forgotten about her.

Dawn merely stared after her old crush in horror, and then glared accusingly at her sister.

Riley slowly frowned, also looking at his former girlfriend.

Giles, almost unconscious, just suffered physically and mentally in silence – as he relived that nightmare of a night once again, inside his skull.

And Buffy...broke down in tears. Part of her knew she'd deserved that. It was the one thing in her past that she wished she'd done differently.

Even more than her problems with Angel and Faith. 

What she'd done that night had caused her to lose her one of her best friends, and now he'd come back from the dead – just to tell her how much he hated her for it.

Willow wasn't faring much better either, at this point. Tara held on to her, trying to console the weeping redhead as best she could.

***

Xander was outside sulking, blowing off steam, whatever you wanted to call it.

He'd known seeing Buffy again would probably devolve into a shouting match. Just like when he'd met Angel in L.A., arguing with Buffy had brought up all the bad memories he'd tried so hard to forget.

The 20-year-old leader of the Lost Boys found it strange that he could stare down an entire army that wanted to kill him, and yet couldn't face a handful of people who were on his side...

So for now, Xander just sat in the dirt, wondering how this could get any worse.

The lyrics from "Fade" by Stain'd echoed in his mind...

_I try to breathe  
Memories overtaking me  
I try to face them but  
the thought is too  
Much to conceive  
I only know that I can change  
Everything else just stays the same  
So now I step out of the darkness  
That my life became 'cause  
I just needed someone to talk to  
You were just too busy with yourself  
You were never there for me to  
Express how I felt  
I just stuffed it down  
Now I'm older and I feel like  
I could let some of this anger fade  
But it seems the surface  
I am scratching  
Is the bed that I have made  
So where were you  
When all this I was going through  
You never took the time to ask me  
Just what you could do_

After a few minutes, Xander heard somebody walking up behind him. The person then sat down on the ground next to him.

"Well, that was the first time I've ever seen Buffy get chewed out like that! Surprised the hell outta me anybody could do it too, without getting a broken nose at minimum..."

Xander didn't reply. He just kept staring forward.

"Maybe I should introduce myself. I'm Riley Finn," and the man held out his hand.

Xander shook it, "Yeah, Faith told me about you. The commando. You're Buffy's boyfriend, right?"

Riley looked ahead. "Well. Not anymore. You see, when Joyce was in the hospital..."

Xander looked at him and interrupted, "Buffy's mom is sick?"

Riley looked down. "She died last month, from an aneurysm after being treated for a brain tumor. Uh, it hit all of us really hard..."

_Oh my God..._

The thing was, Xander had really liked Buffy's mom – she'd always treated him like part of her family, and much better than his own mother ever had. And finding out she was gone made Xander think about how much he'd truly missed Joyce Summers.

But he pushed the thought aside for now. "I'm sorry."

"Thanks. Well, Buffy and I had been having problems before that. Bottom line is, I'd gotten addicted to being bitten by vampires when I couldn't be around her. Believe it or not, it gives you one hell of a rush..."

Riley sighed. "When Buffy found out, we had the biggest fight ever. I finally admitted I had a problem then. Heh, can you imagine a counselling meeting for that? 'Hi, I'm Riley and I'm addicted to vampires sucking my blood'!"

They both snorted with laughter. Riley went on, "After that, I got to work on rehabbing myself. I even gave up an offer to go back into the army, because I wanted to beat this before I committed myself to anything new..."

The young man looked down again. "Then Joyce died. After the funeral, Buffy decided that it'd be best if we just stayed friends. So I decided to stick around, help her and the others through this..."

Xander had more questions for him, "So, what's with the King Arthur reject back in there?" he jerked a thumb toward the gas station.

"Him? He's part of the Knights of Byzantium. A group trying to kill Dawn. They've been dogging us for weeks now."

"Dawn?" Xander was now very confused, "Why her?"

"Turns out Dawn is 'The Key'. There's this hellgod named Glory after it, to open a gateway back to her own dimension. These monks that had the Key, they made it into Dawn nine months ago, so that Buffy would protect it – uh, her. They then altered everyone's memories, to make us all think she's always been around."

"But Riley, I remember her from when Buffy first moved to Sunnydale! She was involved in almost everything for that first 2 ½ years..."

"Yeah, it's weird – I know. We're all still trying to come to grips with it. Even Dawn didn't know what she was. You can imagine how the kid reacted, when she found out! Anyways, Glory didn't know the Key was Dawn...that is, until that wacky bitch Drusilla somehow found out when she came back to Sunnydale, and told Glory."

"Drusilla? You mean, Spike's nutsoid ex Drusilla?"

"The one and only. Now we're on the run, since everything we've tried against Glory doesn't do squat to stop her. She's really powerful."

That put things into perspective for Xander. Now he knew why Lorne had told him he had to be here. He had to help Buffy stop Glory, before he could put his old life behind him.

Xander also started feeling a little guilty about chewing Buffy out, and he made a mental note of talking to her later. "So who's the blonde with Willow?"

"Ah, that's Tara. She's Willow's girlfriend. She also helps Giles run his magic store..."

Xander wanted to ask about other things, like why Spike was there, but Buffy suddenly walked out toward the edge of the force field. She looked remorsefully at Xander, then confronted the de-facto knight in charge.

After a heated discussion the knights agreed to let somebody in to treat Giles, whose condition was quickly worsening.

***

Sometime later, a guy named Ben showed up. He'd been a resident intern at Sunnydale General Hospital, and was a friend of Buffy's. He managed to stabilize Giles, but made it clear the Watcher needed to get to a hospital soon.

Buffy came over to Giles and said, "I'm sorry."

Giles looked somewhat surprised, "For what?"

"We should have stayed. If we had, none of this would have happened."

"Don't. What you did...w-was necessary...what I've always admired..."

Buffy smirked, "Running away?"

"Being able to place...your heart...above all else. I'm so proud of you. You've come so far. You're everything a Watcher...everything I could have hoped for." 

He then grabbed Buffy's arm and pulled her close, "I know...you're upset over Xander. It was...my fault too, why he's so angry...but we can't change what's happened."

He was echoing what Buffy had thought earlier, "But we can...try to make up for it. I think we need him, Buffy."

The Slayer just nodded in response. She agreed entirely. She looked over to Xander, ready to try to mend fences when Ben suddenly ran out of the room.

Dawn and Buffy followed him. "Dawn, what happened?" she asked as they caught up with the doctor.

Her sister had no clue, "I don't know. He just freaked out..."

Ben was frantic, "Let me out! Please! Hurry!"

By now, the others had come into the room to see what was going on. Buffy looked at Willow and said, "Will, open a door!"

"NO!" Ben yelled, and then suddenly morphed into Glory.

Glory took in her surroundings. "Well, what do you know. Little Ben finally did something right!"

The General just looked at her, "The Beast!"

_So that's Glory? Not much to look at...Xander thought._

Glory looked over at the knight, "Hey, it's Gregor!" She then grabbed a hubcap and Frisbee-threw it at Gregor, embedding it in his chest and instantly killing him. "Now it's not!"

_Whoa. Okay, this could be a problem..._

Several of the Scoobies including Xander, Gunn and Faith stood in front of Dawn, between her and Glory. Glory just laughed and with one quick rush knocked them all over, like a set of bowling pins.

She grabbed Dawn, but then Buffy grabbed Glory's shirt to try and get her sister away from the hellgod.

 Glory just punched Buffy hard, blasting her across the room. The young blonde careened into a workbench, her temple hitting the bench's corner with a sickening thud.

With her opponents defeated, Glory disappeared in a fading rush ala The Flash, with Dawn in tow.

Xander, Spike, and Tara all managed to get up first and run after her. When they exited the gas station, they found the force field down and the knights sprawled out, all of them dead.

"We 'ave to go after her, c'mon!" was all Spike said. Gunn and Faith rushed out as soon as Spike finished.

"Where is she?" Faith growled, as the brunette was out for blood. She wasn't about to let that bitch get away with attacking them like this. Gunn didn't look too pleased either.

Tara looked over at Xander, "She'll be headed back to Sunnydale. Xander!" She tossed him a key ring. "Giles has a shop called the Magic Box on Main Street! We'll meet you there. GO!"

Xander didn't need to be told twice. He jumped in, followed by Gunn and Faith, and they sped off in pursuit.

The other Scoobies meanwhile headed back into the gas station, to check on the others. Willow was just coming to and Giles was trying to get up, without much success. Riley was up, and found Buffy out like a light in the back of the room.

She was out cold, and looked likely to stay that way. 

Riley checked for a pulse, and made sure she was breathing. After that, the ex-commando noticed something she was holding on to something. He pried open her hand, and found a strange necklace.

It had an onyx pendant with some weird markings on it, and Riley figured she might've pulled it off Glory. For now, he just shoved the necklace into his pocket and tried help the others as best as he could.

***

Xander was going as fast as his car could manage. They got back on the highway, but never even saw a glimpse of Glory. Their prey had gotten away.

An hour later, the young man gave up any chance of trying to catch her. He just kept going at top speed, toward the town built on the Hellmouth.

A couple of minutes later, Xander knew they were close after passing a road sign saying:

SUNNYDALE  8 MILES

_Home sweet Hell, Xander thought to himself._


	8. The God Awful Truth

**Part 8: The God-Awful Truth (set during BTVS 5, 'The Weight of The World') **

            Xander's car came flying into Sunnydale, about an hour and a half after the encounter with Glory. By coincidence, he drove in taking the exact same route when he'd left two years before.

And that meant driving by Sunnydale High.

Whatever nostalgic feelings Xander had expected, they didn't compare to the shock he felt when the young man saw the ruined hulk of his former alma mater.

"Faith, what in God's name happened here?"

"Remember how the Mayor wanted to ascend?" Xander just nodded. "He was big. Ate a few people, including your old pal Principal Snyder. So we needed a bigger bomb. Totaling the school was just an added bonus."

_I'll say...Xander thought to himself. __That must've been one hell of a party. Huh, for all the shit Snyder put me through though, it's too bad I never saw him get chomped like a triscuit..._

"Or so I've been told. I was kinda in a coma when it happened," added the Slayer guiltily.

After that, Xander started weaving through traffic, making his way to Main Street. It still felt like second nature to him; he wasn't even thinking about where he was going, until the young man came to a very familiar place, at least to himself.

Xander just stopped the car, and stared at the house to the right for a few seconds. He seemed to be making a decision in his mind, while he was looking.

Gunn was puzzled as to why Xander would just stop. "Xander! What's goin' on?"

When Xander didn't reply, and started walking up the steps to the porch of the house Gunn looked at Faith, "Why'd we stop?"

Faith nodded her head toward the house, "I think this is his parents' house..."

Xander couldn't believe he was back here. He hit the front door, and at once felt an odd mixture of anticipation and dread. He wondered how his folks would handle this, then realized maybe he'd made a knee-jerk decision and been a little too hasty in ringing the damn bell.

How would they react to seeing their son, who'd supposedly died years ago, standing there right in front of them?

But logic gave way to emotion for Xander, and he gave in to his primordial need to see his folks again – even if they really weren't good ones. 

"Sir?"

Since he'd been zoning out thinking about this, Xander didn't even notice the woman at the door until she said something.

It was a very attractive woman, probably only a few years older than himself. And at first, Xander thought that his father was dating a tart now.

The idea of Daddy dearest having a mid-life crisis and dumping his Mom actually sounded like a plausible theory, to the young man.

Noticing the woman was wondering just who the hell he was, Xander figured he should say something. "Uh, is Mr. or Mrs. Harris home?"

The woman then looked a little reassured that Xander wasn't some wacko. "No, I'm sorry, they don't live here anymore."

"Don't live here? I don't understand..."

"Apparently, their son died a few years back, and they decided to enter marriage counselling at that point. My husband and I bought the house from them soon afterwards."

That was quite possibly the last thing Xander had expected to hear. "They left?"

"Yeah, at the time Mrs. Harris was pretty far along with their second kid. They didn't want to raise it around here, though, they seemed to be pretty sick of Sunnydale. But with all the weird stuff that happens in town, I don't blame them..."

_That doesn't sound like my family. Mom and Dad, happy together? And Mom's pregnant? What the hell happened while I was gone?_

Xander couldn't believe what he'd just heard. "Did they leave a forwarding address?"

The woman shook her head, "No, I'm sorry. I know the husband mentioned something about going north, but that's about it. Did you know them?"

"Yeah, in another lifetime..." Xander mumbled.

"Excuse me?"

"Nothing. I'm just a friend of the family. Thanks for your help..." With that, Xander walked back to the car.

***

_What did you expect, Xandman? That everything would just be frozen in place, that it'd all still be like the day you left? People do have lives, y'know, they can't just put them on hold for your sake..._

Xander had been telling himself this in the car, after finding out the bombshell about his folks. Gunn and Faith both sympathized with him; all three of them had had parents who hadn't cared, at some point.

Gunn also added that unlike his parents, at least Xander's had seemed to finally get it together.

The former Scooby member was still in awe over what that woman had told him, when they pulled up in front of the Magic Box. Basically, Xander just felt like he'd had his fill of surprises for the night.

Of course, just because he thought that, it didn't mean there weren't one or two more in store for the former Zeppo.

Xander pulled Tara's keys out of his pocket and went to the door, only to find it unlocked. He was sure the Scoobies couldn't have beaten them here...

Thus all three of them walked in to find Angel, Wesley, Cordelia and Lorne sitting at the round table in the back of the shop. And it looked like they had been there for some time.

All of the Fang Gang in the shop looked at the entrance to see who it was, expecting Buffy and the Scoobies. 

Ironically, they all seemed to be surprisingly mellow about seeing Xander. Everyone that is, except for Cordelia.

Now, Cordelia Chase had changed a lot since she'd encountered VampXander two years before. She wasn't the snobbish, popularity-hogging snob from high school anymore.

And Xander had changed too; over a year in L.A. with the Lost Boys had given him quite a bit of responsibility to shoulder, and he bore it well.

Neither of them knew any of this about the other, though.

So when Cordy walked up to Xander, misty-eyed and looking very pale just like Buffy had earlier, she didn't talk. She just slapped the Xander hard, right across the face.

"You've been in L.A. for nearly *two* lousy *years* and you didn't want me to know? You're an absolute bastard, Xander Harris! Do you know what kind of torment I went through because of you? You've got some nerve! You know that? With everything that happened..."

Xander quickly tuned her out at this point. It was a refined art he'd mastered, from several years of boring classes in high school.

Because basically, he just wasn't in the mood to hear, from his perspective, another one of Queen C's rants.

Back in high school, Xander would've just replied to Cordelia with a wiseass comment. But this wasn't high school anymore, and he wasn't about to let Miss High and Mighty Chase get off with acting totally self-righteous.

So the young man interrupted her little speech, with the truth as he saw it.

"Gee, Cordelia, lemme think – why did I not want you to know I was around? Oh, yeah! Considering how you made my life a living *hell* the last few days I was in Sunnydale, why in God's name would I ever even have *wanted* to talk to you?"

Xander looked pissed. "Let me refresh your memory – now, what WERE some of the last words you ever spoke to me?" Xander's voice had a mean, sarcastic tone at this point, while he ticked off a list.

"Yeah, let's see: 'Xander, you're the useless part of the group'. And also: 'You're, like, this little nothing'. Or my favorite, the big finale: 'On another life-or-death doughnut mission, or are we just cruising for bimbos again, giving them lessons in lack of cool?'"

Xander growled, "You starting to remember now? So tell me, 'Queen C', what makes ya think I'd ever wanna see *your* face again?!"

One thing about Xander Harris, after the torment of those last few days in his former home town – he remembered crystal clear every little thing that had happened, during that time.

Add to that the fact that these two hadn't exactly parted under the best of circumstances, it meant that sparks had been destined to fly between them when they finally crossed paths after all this time.

As for Cordelia, part of her wanted to slap Xander all over again after that little rant. But another part of her knew that her ex-boyfriend was pretty much right on target with his tirade, even if it was just an outburst.

It wasn't that either of them were wrong in their arguments, it was just that they weren't the same people they'd been back in high school.

But that didn't prevent the insults from starting to be hurled around...

"...becoming Gunn's lackey? Sure, Xander, you've really accomplished something in life..."

"And I suppose Angel hired you for your incredible talents, like...oh, yeah! You don't have any! I'm guessing Deadboy isn't the only dead weight around there..."

They kept going back and forth like this, with everyone in the room giving them a wide berth lest they be dragged into the raging inferno.

Wesley, remembering what had happened with VampXander two years before, wisely kept his distance. It was the first time he'd ever met the real Xander face-to-face, and it gave the Englishman goosebumps seeing the boy alive like this.

Gunn, Faith, and Lorne had all had encounters with both Xander and Cordy though, and knew what they were capable of when prodded. And even Angel, whose protective streak of Cordelia was like a mile wide, opted to take the Switzerland route this time.

"Separate!"

Xander felt himself being pulled backward. So did Cordelia. They both looked at the entrance to see Willow, with Tara and Spike behind her, not looking particularly amused. 

"Buffy's still unconscious. Glory has Dawn. Sometime real soon, she's gonna use Dawnie to tear down the barrier between every dimension there is. So if you two wanna fight, do it after the world ends, okay?!"

Everyone was silent at this point, as the glare Willow had could've made Glory herself wince in fear.

The witch used this to her advantage, and took charge of the situation. "All right. We need to find Glory..."

"What the hell. I'll do that, I'm not doing anything constructive around here," was all that Xander said.

Willow looked at him, "Okay. Check her apartment, see if she's still there. And, oh yeah..." the witch then scanned the entire room and told the gathering, "Try anything stupid, like payback, and I will get Very Cranky. Everyone clear on that?"

Everybody present understood Willow's comment. After all, they'd all had some type of problem with somebody else there, at some point or another.

Angel, Riley and Spike had all come to blows at different times over Buffy, and weren't exactly fond of each other.

Several of them hated Faith, and Xander of course had an equal-opportunity loathing for most of those present in the magic shop.

The young man just left without another word. Cordelia sat back down and took a couple of deep breaths, trying to calm herself down.

"So where's Buffy?" was all that Angel asked.

Tara answered, "Riley took her to the hospital."

Gunn looked over at Angel, who was too caught up from hearing Buffy was injured. He felt kind of hurt the vampire with a soul hadn't even acknowledged his presence yet. "Uh, nice to see you too. Question. How'd ya all know we'd be here?"

***

The Previous Night

In Caritas, Landok (or Landokmar of the Deathwok clan) was on the stage muttering the words from the book needed to take him back to Pylea. A portal opened and he fell backwards through it, safely on his way back home.

After the portal closed Angel, Wesley and Lorne just looked on. They were just relieved it was finally over.

"Wha-what's say we all forget this ever happened?" came the question from the weary Host.

Angel had no problems with this suggestion. "I'm down with that. Wesley?"

"Fine with me." Wesley agreed too. "Cordy?"

When he didn't hear anything from Cordelia he asked again, "Cordelia?"

"Cordy!" Angel quickly turned around for her, but didn't see her.

"Will you chill out? I'm right here." The seer popped up from behind the bar, several feet away from the men.

Wesley sat on one of the barstools, starting to relax again. "Oh, thank God. For a second, I thought you were sucked into the portal..."

"With all the hellish stuff that came through that thing? Yeah right, I'll keep a respectable distance away, thank you very much..." Cordelia said, as she pulled out a shot glass and a bottle of apple Schnapps.

Lorne piped in, "Why don't you pour one for all of us, beautiful. After the night we've had, we deserve it."

Cordy poured three more for the others, and slammed down her drink. Wesley followed suit as soon as she put down her glass, then looked at Lorne, "Do you have a phone I can use?"

"Sure. It's behind the bar."

Wes squeezed past Cordy, to make a call. Lorne saw Angel thinking to himself at one of the tables so he grabbed both their drinks, and sat down with him. "Somethin troubling ya, Angelcakes?"

"I'm just tired, that's all. Well, I guess this is another successful mission." Angel held up his drink. "Cheers!"

They clinked their glasses together, and took their shots. Suddenly from behind the bar, Wesley looked very stunned and yelled, "Angel!"

That scared the hell out of Angel. He coughed up his drink and bent over, trying not to choke. He turned around looking like he just had heart failure at Wes, "WHAT?!?"

"I called the office to check the machine. I think you should hear this." Wes dialed the number again, and hit the speaker button for everyone to else to hear.

"Hi! This is Amanda from Hairstyles Salon, for Mr. Angel? Your order, a 2-lb bottle of 'Chicks' extra hold hair gel is in. Feel free to pick it up anytime. Thank you."

Cordy just had an odd look at Angel "Okay, that's a life or death situation?"

Angel just looked very embarrassed, muttering something about revenge.

Wes was focusing on the machine though, "No, no! The one after that..."

The next message played, "Angel, it's me. There's something here in Sunnydale. A hellgod. She's more powerful than anything I've ever faced. And...and I can't beat her by myself. Please, I need you here as soon as possible."

The four occupants didn't say anything during the message. They just crowded around the phone to hear it better.

Angel looked up after the recording finished, "That was Buffy." He started pacing around the club, pondering this new development.

"She sounded pretty upset," Wes added. "Angel, I think we need to find out what's happening in Sunnydale at once..."

"No." Angel stopped and looked back up, "That'll take too long. We have to go and help them. Wes, we need to find Gunn. We'll need him for this..."

"Angel, I've tried getting ahold of Gunn all night but he's not answering his pager. I don't know where he is."

Lorne injected, "Oh, don't worry about him. He's probably halfway there by now..."

The Fang Gang had no idea what Lorne was talking about. Cordelia beat the others to the punch, "Why would Gunn head to Sunnydale?"

"Well, actually he's tagging along with Xander to..." Lorne suddenly realized he'd let that slip without even thinking, and looked shocked at his error.  "…oh crap."

Angel and Wesley both stared wide-eyed at him, with an 'I can't believe you just said that!' look.

But not Cordelia. The mere mention of Xander's name evoked a lot of painful memories, and an expression of disbelief.

"Xander? Xander Harris? He's dead! I killed him!" She turned to Angel and Wes for support. "Right?"

When they avoided her stare though, Cordy started thinking something was not adding up. "Right?!"

Angel was trying to think of something to say, "Um...Cordy...you see...well...Wes has something to tell you. He's in charge, after all..."

"Me?!? Angel, not telling her was in fact your bright idea...!" The ex-Watcher went defensive, as soon as the vampire tried to dump this on him.

Lorne shook his head. "Enough! I'll tell her. Cordelia, look, Xander's alive. In fact, he arrived in L.A. shortly after you did. Angel found him last year, but our boy didn't wanna socialize, he just wanted to be left alone. That's why they didn't tell you."

The shock on her face quickly turned to anger. With a nasty glare at Angel she yelled, "You knew?!?"

Then she turned to Wesley, "You both knew?!? And you weren't going to tell me and Gunn because-?!"

"Actually, he's Gunn's best friend..."

But Wesley's comment just ticked off Cordy even more. "YOU ALL KNEW?!? All right, we are going back to Sunnydale right *now*! And I'm going to have words with Xander Harris!!"

Angel tried to calm down his friend, "Cordy, wait a sec. We need to..."

But Cordelia grabbed Angel and Wesley by the ear before Angel could finish, and dragged them toward the stairs.

"Ouch! Hey! Ahh!"

"Ow! Ow! Ow!"

Lorne looked on at the leaving trio, "Oh, that's gotta hurt. Ah well, hasta luego people! Send me a postcard or whatever..."

Cordy walked back over to Lorne, "Oh no, you're coming too!"

"Me? But I have a club to run!" Lorne tried to weasel out of it, but Cordy just gave him the same icy glare she'd just given Angel.

Lorne shoulders slumped down, "Fine. Just let me lock up..."

***

Angel and Wes shuddered, remembering the night before. The saying 'Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned' described perfectly Cordelia's mood during the entire trip to Sunnydale.

And after hearing what his comrades had gone through, Gunn felt pretty lucky he'd escaped Cordelia's wrath.

Faith just looked around at the crowd with a smirk. She'd been right when she'd told Xander that something big would be happening in town when they got there.

"Wow. Just about all the old players in Sunnydale managed to get here! Anybody else expecting Oz to show up?" she raised her hand for emphasis.

"Wouldn't surprise me..." Angel replied with a shrug.

***

Meanwhile, Xander was outside walking down Main Street after leaving the Magic Box.

"Hey, Monkey Boy, wait up!" Spike was attempting to get Xander's attention, while trying to catch up to him.

"Spike? What do you want?"

"You left in such a bloody huff, do you even know where Glory lives?"

_Uh...yeah, that might be a problem..._

"C'mon, I'll show you. Uh, just wondering, what do we do if we find Ben?" Xander looked confused at Spike's question, "You know. Ben is Glory."

Xander didn't understand, "Ben works for Glory?"

"No. No. Ben is Glory. Glory's Ben. They're one 'n the same..." The former Zeppo just kept staring at Spike, as the vampire lit a cigarette.

"You do remember...? What, are you stoned? Ben! Glory! He's a doctor, she's the Beast. Two entirely separate entities, sharing one body. Like a bloody sitcom. Surely you remember?"

Since the person he was talking to had no clue what Spike was going on about, the neutered demon put two and two together.

"Oh, I get it. That's very crafty! Glory's worked the kind of mojo where anyone who sees her little prest-o/change-o instantly forgets. And yours truly, being somewhat other than human...stands immune."

Spike could've been talking to a wall, for all it mattered.

Giving up, the vamp looked Xander up and down. "So, whelp, I see you finally grew a pair in L.A. Stood up to the Slayer, and beat on those walkin' tin cans pretty damn well. Enjoying bein' home yet?"

Xander really didn't want to deal with the so-called Big Bad, and started walking again. "I really don't wanna talk about it. Especially with you! 'Cause I haven't forgotten what happened, the last time we met..."

Spike squirmed, uncomfortable. "Ancient history. Dru left me again, anyway..."

"Whatever, point is you wouldn't understand..."

"Not understand? I'm the sodding pariah of the entire bloody vampire community! Slayer and her groupies hate me. And I can't even 'urt people, because of this damn chip in my head! Wanna bet I'm not the same as you?"

"Well, I guess – maybe. Man, I tell you – just being here, it all feels so wrong! Buffy and Willow hate me. And Cordy really hates me...I just want it to be over, so I can go home to L.A. And why is it that I feel like nothing I do will ever measure up? Thing is, I don't even want to prove anything. And I shouldn't have to..."

Xander stopped ranting, not wanting Spike to be his crying shoulder. "Never mind. C'mon, let's find this hell-bitch's place..."

***

Glory's apartment was a mess. She wasn't there, but they did manage to find Ben's hospital ID. 

Once at the hospital, after Spike had lifted a bag of blood from a cart, they found Riley and he brought Xander and Spike up to speed on Giles, Buffy and the mental patients.

"The vegetable section's closed. Nobody there. It's like they all just got up and walked away. Giles is checking himself out now. He's pretty beat up, but he's gonna make it."

"And Buffy?" was all that Spike asked, looking a little too concerned.

"A pretty nasty concussion. The doctors are calling it a miracle she's not an invalid after taking a blow like that. Any other person would be. Of course, they don't know Buffy like we do. Uh, Glory's place was a total bust? So...any other ideas?" the ex-commando asked.

Spike still had one left. "I know this bloke. Well, not so much a bloke, so much as a demon. But still, bookish. All tuned in to the nastier corners o' this our magic world. It's a bit of a last resort, really; but still, we might persuade 'im to suss out Glory's game plan, since there wasn't much in Ben's room at Glory's pad. We'll meet you back at the shop..."

Xander caught up to Spike as he was leaving, "Wait, wait, wait. Ben? At Glory's? You're saying all this time, he's been subletting from her?"

Spike rolled his eyes, "This...is gonna be worth it." He slapped Xander on the head, and they both reacted in pain.

***

They both quickly made it to Doc's place. At least, that was what the guy's name was according to Spike. The former Big Bad had said it was a shot in the dark, but they had no other choice.

The guy went through formalities. Xander could've sworn Doc had looked surprised to see him; which was strange, considering he'd never met the guy before.

While Spike and Doc were going on about Glory, Xander just stayed back, thinking to himself. _Yeah, I hope this guy can help us with Glory. Ya know, I wonder whatever happened to Ben after that fight in the gas station? After that, I didn't see him and...wait a sec...that's it!_

"Ben's Glory!"

Doc looked up. "Who's what?"

"Look at this. Special Ed remembers," Spike looked amused.

"Yeah. I do. Ben's Glory and Glory's Ben. It's like this...fog's lifting..."

Spike just got back to trying to get information out of Doc. They kept badgering back and forth, until Doc told Spike flat out there wasn't much he could do for him.

"You're lying. And what's more...I believe you're standin' right in front of the very thing we need."

Spike hadn't believed Doc was telling the truth for a second. Xander noticed now that Doc had seemed to be looking at a small wooden box the entire time. Apparently Spike had too, and he was calling Doc's bluff.

Doc smiled and used his tongue, which was several feet long, to lash out at Xander. The boy felt the blow hit his chest, and dropped down to his knees in pain. Spike rushed him, but Doc knocked the vampire into the wall and also into a daze.

After throwing the box in question into the fireplace, Doc quickly grabbed a sword and held it at Xander's throat.

Both of them should've realized that Doc wasn't the harmless old man he'd appeared to be. And the demon, for his part, looked pretty full of himself.

"You think only underworld bottom-feeders worship the Beast? Her day is coming, boys! And when she returns, then you're gonna see something!"

He then looked at Xander, "And you. I never expected to see you again..."

Xander looked at the sword pointed at his neck, then back at Doc. "What are you talking about?"

With a sadistic grin, Doc elaborated, "Oh, yes, you don't know! Well, now. You see, in the original history the great Glorificus fell in battle, against the Slayer and her lackeys. To think your little blonde whore thought throwing me off a seven-storey scaffold would kill me! I just went back into the past, to find a way to stop all of you from making it there to the big event."

He laughed again. "You were the best target, boy. You were so emotionally unstable and pathetic back then. Well, I guess you still are..."

Doc continued, "It was really quite easy. All I had to do was whisper in that stupid principal's ear, and have him catch you the night you disabled that bomb. It worked even better than I thought!"

Full of merriment he explained, "You were devastated and left town, and that tactless bitch you would have eventually gotten engaged to never met you and left Sunnydale as well. So she never helped the Slayer either! I killed two birds with one stone – it was perfect! Of course, you still somehow found your way back here. So I guess I better fix that right now..."

The last two years had been, for the most part, a hellish existence for Xander Harris. Whatever he'd done, there was always something that somehow went wrong.

Alonna's death being the worst example.

And hearing Doc gloat about how he'd destroyed his life...that was the last straw.

Xander had been destined to dwell in Sunnydale, to have found his significant other, to still be close with his old friends.

All of it gone, because of this guy. This *thing* had ruined any chance he'd had of being happy.

And all at once, Xander lost it. He abandoned all self-control, and went after the demon. 

He batted away the sword in Doc's hand, and pushed him against the wall. The leader of the Lost Boys then started beating on the creature in front of him, as fast as he possibly could.

When Doc slumped against the wall and fell to the floor, Xander just kept kicking him in the chest. His mind at this point wasn't working, just focusing on revenge – which the only thing the young man felt he had left.

_You bastard! You piece of shit! You destroyed my life!_

Having not finished with his opponent, Xander grabbed the sword Doc had dropped and he impaled the demon on it – causing blue blood to spray everywhere.

Spike, at this point, had managed to pull the box out of the fire and silently thanked any god listening that he wasn't Xander's victim in the corner.

"Whatever's in 'ere, it's good enough to die for..."

Xander didn't acknowledge Spike, or even look at him. He just kept staring at Doc's body.

"Uh, yeah, so I'll just wait for ya out there, then..." Spike knew staying too close to his companion might not be too wise right now.

Xander, still coming to grips with this latest revelation, suddenly remembered the last thing Lorne had told him at Caritas.

_No Alexito, it's never that simple. When you go back, you'll find out the truth. I just hope it doesn't destroy you in the process..._

Xander collapsed into the chair Doc had been sitting on. He hadn't lost it when he'd been kicked out of the Scoobies, he hadn't broken down when Alonna was killed...but now, the boy couldn't take it anymore.

Xander buried his hands in his face, and cried. He felt like no matter what he did, somehow he would never win; that something or someone would always hold him down, make him lose, and in the end he would have nothing to show for it all.

Xander couldn't deal anymore; well, not many people could have.

After all the hammer blows his psyche had taken, he was on the verge of total meltdown. And at that point, his mind's involuntary defenses kicked in.

In a last-ditch effort to stave off insanity, his brain did the only thing it could; it closed itself off from the outside world, and started to hunker down against the upcoming maelstrom of emotion.

With tears still running down his face, Xander just started staring off into oblivion.

***

Spike came walking in a few minutes later after finishing his cigarette, hoping that it had been enough time for Xander to recover.

"C'mon already, we gotta get this stuff back to Buffy..."

Xander didn't say anything; he just kept staring straight ahead. His blinking eyes were the only things that told Spike the boy wasn't dead.

"Hey Droopy Boy, will ya move it?!"

Sensing something was wrong, Spike snapped his fingers in Xander's face, then tried shaking him – but to no avail. "Oy! Wake up!"

Nothing was working, and Spike realized this was a real problem. His arms fell to his sides, and he looked up at the ceiling.

"Oh, bloody hell..."


	9. Coming to Terms

**Part 9: Coming to Terms (set during BTVS season 5, 'The Gift')**

            At the Magic Box, things weren't going much better for the Scoobies. Anything they had on Glory was pretty thin. Willow had mentioned that if it weren't for Travers and the Council, they probably wouldn't have had anything at all.

Several of them were combing over every single book in the store, desperately looking for something that would show them how Glory would use Dawn to break down the barriers between worlds, and thus cause Armageddon.

Gunn wasn't exactly the researcher in their group. That was Wesley's strong point, not his. So he just rifled through the book in front of him, not really making much of an effort to understand this very difficult description in front of him. 

So when his cell phone rang, the black man was happy for any excuse to stop.

"Hello!" Gunn answered, almost a little too enthusiastically. His smile quickly changed though into a frown, as he listened to the person talking to him.

"He what? Where are you? Uh huh. I'm on my way...Spike? Spike?"

Everyone in the room was looking at him, at this point. Cordelia asked him, "Gunn, what is it?"

He looked at everyone, "That was Spike. They found some demon guy, but somethin' happened to Xander. Damn connection cut out. I need a ride!"

"I'll drive," Angel immediately got up, and ran for the door. Gunn followed him out and Faith left too, all of them using this as an excuse to avoid research.

***

Almost ten minutes later, Giles came staggering into his shop. Behind him was Buffy and Riley. She was slowly walking in, and had her arm around Riley for support.

Everyone looked concerned, "Buffy! Are you guys alright?"

With a strained look Buffy leaned against the checkout counter and told Willow, "Yeah, Will. I'm just a little..." 

She almost lost her balance and would've crashed to the floor, but Giles was there to catch her and help her into a chair.

Riley told the gathering, "This isn't that bad. An hour ago, she couldn't even sit upright. I managed to BS the hospital to release her into my custody..."

Whatever fueled Buffy's abilities as the Slayer seemed to be helping with her recovery. True, at this point in Buffy's state, Glory could kill her without breaking a sweat. So they needed time, time for her to recover and time to think of how to stop the hellgod.

But to many of them, it seemed like time was the one thing they were running out of.

***

"Ahhh! You wanker! Lemme go!"

When Angel, Gunn and Faith arrived at Doc's place, they found Xander and Spike alone. Spike hadn't mentioned what exactly had happened to Xander, only that he was hurt. So when the trio got there and they found their friend from L.A. nearly comatose...

"Aaaahhhh! Let go of me!"

...they didn't take it too well.

Angel had just slammed Spike against the wall a second time. Gunn stood to the side of him, not very happy his best friend was in this condition. He got right in Spike's face, mere inches from his nose. "What did you do to him?!"

"I'm telling ya, I didn't do anything!" Spike threw his arms up and broke Angel's grip on him, then pointed to the corner of the room.

"That dead bloke in the corner did this. I got ahold of you, just before Xander's phone went dead!"

Spike wasn't too thrilled being the accused here. In fact he was tempted to beat the crap out of Angel, and thought punching Gunn might be worth the migraine that followed it.

"Oops," Faith remembered she forgot to turn Xander's cell phone off, after using it that morning. Trying to deflect attention off of herself she asked, "Um, Spike, what dead guy?"

They all looked to the corner where Faith was standing, and all that was present was some type of blue substance all over the place – just like what was on Xander's shirt. Doc was gone.

"Oh, you 'ave *got* to be kiddin' me!" Spike was getting really nervous now, any bravado he'd showed toward Angel a second ago simply vanished now that his alibi had disappeared. 

"Damn idiot's vanished like a fart in the wind! Look, I 'ad nothing to do with Xander being like that, you gotta believe me!"

Angel just responded by shoving Spike into the wall again. "Here's the deal: you're going to tell us what happened. And trust me, if we don't like your role the only argument will be over which one of us stakes you. Now spill it!"

***

The door to the Magic Box flew open, and the occupants saw Angel and Gunn carrying in a comatose Xander. With a free hand Gunn pulled a chair that was close to the door over, and they both carefully put him down on it while Angel yelled, "Giles, we need your help!"

The Brit got over to the entrance as quickly as possible, noticing Xander's shirt was covered in blue blood. "Xander? Oh dear God, what happened?" 

Angel and Gunn's frantic pace, along with Giles' sudden concern quickly got everyone else's attention.

At seeing Xander, the reaction was varied. Willow and Cordelia immediately rushed over to him, and Willow got right in front of Xander. "Xander? Xander, can you hear me?"

Buffy instantly shot up from her chair to do the same, but was hit by a wave of vertigo from her concussion. She spiraled to the ground, the nausea from her injury causing her to empty the contents of her stomach onto the floor.

Giles mimicked Willow's earlier attempt to get Xander's attention, with no luck. When he looked at Angel for an explanation, Angel walked over to the still-open door, reached out and pulled Spike in by the collar of his leather duster.

Faith was behind him holding a burnt, ornate box – she was making sure the former Big Bad didn't try to do his own disappearing act. Angel dragged Spike over to the crowd, "Alright, now you tell them what you told us."

"Right. Xander went with me to see this demon, guy what might know something about Glory. Turns out he's one of her worshippers, and after beatin' on me for a while – he did the same to the whelp 'ere. Then he tells him he went back to change things, and well...Xander just lost it."

Spike wouldn't have believed it if he hadn't been there himself, "And when I came to, he was like this."

"What do you mean, 'went back'?" Cordelia had no idea what Spike was talking about. None of them did.

"He changed the past...somethin' about Captain Comatose being caught with a bomb? Anyway, Doc bragged 'ow he'd changed it, so that Monkey Boy 'ad to leave town 'n all..."

Now, all of the original Scoobies knew about that event in Xander's life. The others who hadn't been there, had heard it secondhand in great detail.

Giles turned his attention to Spike after he finished, "Let me understand this, you claim this demon friend of yours went back in time and changed history? This is preposterous!"

But Spike didn't care what everyone else thought, and just kept pressing his case. "Oh, gimme a break Rupert! You all thought Droopy Face there was dead, and 'ere he is alive! Everyone thought Dawn was just a stupid teenager, and she turns out to be this mystical lot o' bleedin' magic energy! Now how unbelievable is this?"

Then the peroxide-blonde vamp added his own analysis, "You ask me, it's possible. I know this guy. And I'd hedge my bets this wasn't the only thing he messed with in the past..."

Everyone was chilled, like they'd all just felt liquid helium in their stomachs. The idea of their pasts being changed for the worse was something none of them liked at all.

Unfortunately for Xander, he'd had no choice in the matter and thus suffered the effects. It left all of them wondering what else Doc might have changed.

Giles went back to Xander, "It's impossible to know for sure what happened. But after all that Xander's been through...I think it's pushed him too far, i-into some sort of catatonia."

Angel filled in one of the blanks as well, "There's something else. Last year, Xander's girlfriend was killed. He took it really hard..." 

Gunn just looked away, with his eyes tightly shut. Not wanting to think about what he'd done to Alonna, and the pain he and Xander shared.

By now Lorne had made his way over to Xander, "Yeah, I was afraid of this. I saw Xander facing something nasty in his aura. I just never thought it'd be like..."

Giles faced Lorne and looked very upset, "You knew this would happen to him, and you didn't tell him?!"

"Hey, my job was to put Xander on his path just like everyone else. I can't hold everyone's hand through it."

"You could've done something. For God's sake, look at him!"

Unfortunately, Lorne knew that Giles wouldn't understand. Each person had to walk his or her own path. Lorne's role was a guide, nothing more. There was only so much the Host could do, and as much as he might want to interfere it would only be detrimental to that person. 

Arguing with Giles wouldn't change that rule. Lorne just gave up trying to make him see that, and walked out of the Magic Box – not expecting anyone to understand. 

Right after Lorne left, Faith walked over to Wesley and handed him the box. "We found this, it might be something important..."

***

A couple of minutes later, Angel and Cordelia walked outside and joined the brooding Host.

"They send you two out here?"

Angel shook his head, "No, I figured I should try looking for Glory. After you walked out, Spike said Doc mentioned something about a scaffold. Figure it might be a good place to look."

"Easier said than done, Angel. Construction is the biggest industry in Sunnydale, what with all the destruction that takes place here..."

Cordelia had a point. Searching every construction site might take too long, but Lorne had an idea...

"I might be able to help with that. Remember how Landok used his abilities to track the Drokken?" 

Angel and Cordy nodded. 

"Well, what I do is kinda similar to that. If Glory's out there, I might be able to narrow down where she might be. Uh, bear in mind though I'm not nearly as good as my cousin at this. No, actually, I'm nowhere near as good as that."

Seeing no other alternative, Angel went along with it. "It's better than nothing. Let's give it a try."

***

Sometime later in the training room of Giles' store, Willow was setting up what she needed to hopefully be able to help Xander. He was on a chair with Willow a couple of feet in front of him, staring at nothing.

There were several lit candles around the two. The spell entailed her going into Xander's mind, and snapping him out of his catatonic state.

Xander looked unchanged from before, still just blankly staring ahead.

The lyrics from "Innocent" by Fuel went through Willow's mind...

_Satan, you know where I lie  
Gently I go into that good night  
All our lives get complicated  
Search for pleasures overrated  
Never armed our souls   
For what the future would hold  
When we were innocent  
_

Just as Willow was about to start the spell, she heard the door open. It was Buffy, slowly walking in. She still wasn't 100%, but she looked somewhat improved from before.

"Wha-? You shouldn't be in here! Buff, you should be resting..."

"I can't. I just feel so useless right now. Everyone's doing everything else in the store."

"Well, there really isn't much you can do."

"Will, I need a favor." Buffy sat down next to her. "This spell you're using to go into Xander's mind...is there any way to bring me in too?"

"No. No way! Buffy, this spell is dangerous enough with just me. In your shape, I don't know what it could do to you!"

"Will, please! Xander's like this because of me! It's my fault he left...why he's like this. I have to try to make up for that."

"Buffy, Doc did this to him – not you..." Willow tried to convince Buffy this wasn't her fault, but the Slayer would have none of it.

"No! Willow, I shouldn't have done what I did to him two years ago. It wasn't Doc who said all those things that made him leave – that was me. All me..."

It would've been easy to blame somebody else, but the blonde Slayer couldn't bring herself to say that. Xander had been her friend and now, well now he hated the sight of her. 

And she had nobody to blame for that, but herself.

Giles was right; they couldn't change what had happened all those years ago. The only thing she could do was try to make up for it.

"All right. But like, I can't make any promises..."

Willow reluctantly held out her hand, and Buffy took it. They sat down in front of Xander and stared into his eyes, and the room suddenly went white. The two found themselves standing in the boiler room of Sunnydale High.

In the center of the room was Xander, sitting on a folder chair – just staring at something on a table, in the center of the room. 

"Xander!" Willow rushed over to him, with Buffy behind her. "Xander, we have to get you out of here!"

Xander just kept staring straight ahead, "Hey, guys. Nice of you to make it. Just in time for the big sendoff..."

"Sendoff?" Willow asked.

"Uh, Will?" 

Willow turned around, and found Buffy in front of what Xander was staring at. It was a bomb, just like the one he'd disabled so long ago. However, this one's timer was active and just ticked passed the one-hour mark.

They both looked very worried. "Okay, so we're working with a deadline..." the redhead muttered.

Willow turned around, but Xander wasn't there anymore. "Xander?" 

Suddenly the boiler room door behind them flew open, scaring them. They both walked to the entrance and Willow asked, "So what now?"

"I guess we go through..."

***

Angel, Cordelia and Lorne were all on a hilltop, overlooking a construction site about 200 yards away.

Lorne had turned out to be a better tracker than he'd thought. It was only the third site the three of them had checked out, and they'd hit the jackpot. 

Angel was looking through the binoculars he'd brought with him from the hotel, and could clearly make out Glory and several of her minions.

***

Glory was in a foul mood. Doc had arrived, and told her that the Scoobies had got the information they needed to find out what Glory's ritual entailed. 

Namely, that Dawn would be used in a bloodletting ceremony to break down the barrier between dimensions.

She hadn't been idle the last few days, though. Drusilla had close to two dozen vampires guarding the site, along with the hellgod's minions and most of the escaped mental patients. It was quite a formidable screening force, but Glory wasn't about to stop there. 

Sure she outnumbered the Scoobies and the other whitehats, but they were much better fighters than her forces. Was quality was better than quantity? Glory didn't want to find out.

"Daddy's watching. Him and his seers are spyin' on me..."

Glory ignored what was to her another of Dru's ramblings, while the crazy vampiress stared off into the distance. "Where's Amy? Amy!"

Jynx and another of his brethren dragged Amy from the other side of the site, over to Glory. Both Drusilla and Amy were wearing rather expensive, long black dresses. 

To Amy, Glory's fervent desire to be surrounded by fashion models was only trumped by her insane mission to destroy the world.

"Amy, I gave you a spell to cast a protective ward a while ago. So do it already!"

"Glory, I told you – I don't think I can cast something that powerful..."

Glory reached under her robes to scare Amy into doing what she wanted. She didn't have her necklace anymore; Buffy had ripped it off her at the gas station.

But Amy didn't know that, and it meant Glory could maintain her illusion of control over the Wicca. "Do we really have to go through this again, you idiot brat?"

Glory's trick worked. Amy spread both her arms out, chanting some incomprehensible language. She then clapped hands above her head, and an energy shield surrounded the entire construction site. 

Amy fell to her knees, feeling blood trickling out of her nose and wanting nothing more than to kill Glory incredibly painfully.

***

"What the hell?" Angel looked surprised, at the shield that suddenly came up over the scaffold.

Lorne knew what it was, "Ah man...that looks like some kinda protection spell. I have one over my club..." 

Angel looked back with his binoculars. Glory wasn't anywhere to be seen. He did see his childe Drusilla, and she seemed to be staring right back at him – even though there was no way anyone down there could see them.

The souled vampire saw Dru's evil stare, and it caused the hairs on the back of Angel's neck to stand up.

"Angel, what do you see?" Cordy asked.

"It's Drusilla."

"Oh, God. Is Darla there too?"

"No...I don't think so..." Angel was grateful for that, not wanting Cordelia to find out he actually had slept with Darla. 

"Hmm...lotsa vampires, couple of rat-faced demons. Um, wait a sec – I've seen that brunette girl before. Cordy, I think she went to Sunnydale High with you..." the vampire trailed off.

Angel passed the binoculars to Cordelia, and she found who Angel was talking about. After a few seconds it came to her, "That's Amy. But she was turned into a rat!"

"This is getting very strange. I think we should head back and let the others in on what we've found," Angel said, as he got back into his car.

"Oh goody, back to the magic store..." Lorne's sarcastic tone made it seem like he wasn't too happy at that idea.

Angel was actually pleased that for once it was the Host, and not him in the quagmire. "Not enjoying yourself?"

"No. Tonight's been great! I've had a demon trash my club, your friend Giles chews me out for no reason at all and Crazy God down there wants to destroy the world. It's only slightly less wonderful than that ulcer I had last year..."

***

After coming through the boiler room door, Buffy and Willow found themselves in an alley at night. They were both wearing their costumes from Halloween, three years before.

Buffy had on her 18th century gown, and Willow was in her leather Goth outfit. Both girls looked at their clothes, and wondered what was going on.

"Well, this brings back memories. Spike almost killed us that night," Buffy said somewhat nervously.

Willow added, "Yeah, but Spike almost killed us quite a few times. What makes this one different from the rest?"

They got their answer, almost a minute later. Xander came running through the alley toward them in his solider costume, with the sounds of massive fighting close by. With the same unemotional tone he'd had that night, he said, "Ladies, welcome to Hell. What brings you here?"

Since Willow had had no luck before, Buffy tried getting through to Xander. "Xander, please! We need your help!"

The solider just put his hand up, "Don't. Before you go through the big speech, let me just tell you I'm not Xander."

"Not Xander?" Buffy asked.

He tried to explain, "I'm that part of the solider that stayed in Xander's mind, after Halloween. Since I know a lot of useful stuff, I stay in the background and offer him help from time to time. I'm kinda a separate personality, uh – Xander calls me Harvey."

"Harvey?" Now it was Willow's turn to be confused.

"Yeah, it's strange – I know. You ask me, I think he watches too much TV."

Buffy hadn't really paid attention to Professor Walsh's lecture on multiple personalities, since they'd been too busy trying to deal with the Initiative at the time. "Um...okay, Harvey. Can you help us help Xander?"

"'Fraid not. I'm doing everything I can, just to keep his mind from completely falling apart here. With everything he's been through, Xander's just about ready to end it. He's got a thousand and one reasons why..."

Harvey winced. "If you find him, you have to convince him not to give up. Think of something. How he feels right now, it's almost impossible to describe: hurt...upset...tired...scared ...and that's not all of it. You girls have your work cut out for you. Yeah, lotsa luck..." 

Harvey abruptly turned around and ran back toward the battle, leaving Willow and Buffy pondering what he said. A second later there was another flash of white, and the two were in the basement of the abandoned building the Lost Boys stayed in.

"Oh, hey guys!" Xander and Alonna were a few feet in front of them.

"Xander, we need to tell you something," Willow was pleading with her friend at this point.

"It's okay Will, I understand. I finally figured it all out," Xander said as he smiled at Alonna, and touched her face.

"You did?"

"Yeah..." He pulled out a stake and stabbed Alonna in the chest. As Alonna put her hand up to her chest in shock just before she turned to dust a few seconds later, Xander looked back at a horrified Willow and Buffy. 

"...I'm meant to be alone forever."

***

Angel had made it back to the Magic Box, and told them all about Glory's little construction project and who was there. That, together with the information Spike had recovered from Doc improved the long shot they'd had of stopping Glory.

Even now Wesley and Giles were poring over the documents from Doc's place, and were close to having a good feel of what the bad guys had in store for Dawn.

"Giles, if the information here is correct – then we have a problem..."

"Damn it Wesley, I know, but it's the only way." Giles took off his glasses, and massaged the bridge of his nose.

"So, what do we know?" Cordy asked trying to pry information from the former Watchers. 

Giles knew more about this than his research partner. "Um...well, uh...according to these scrolls, uh, it's possible for Glory to be stopped. I-I'm afraid it's, um...well I've read these things very carefully and there's not much...margin for error. You understand what I'm saying?"

Faith walked over to Giles, "Might help if you actually said it."

Giles went over his notes to make sure he got this right, "Um...Glory...plans to open a...dimensional portal...by way of a ritual bloodletting. Once the blood is shed at a certain time and place...the fabric which separates all realities will...be ripped apart. Dimensions will...pour into one another, uh, with no barriers to stop them. Reality as we know it will be destroyed, and...chaos will reign on Earth."

By now, Gunn had joined listening in along with everyone else and asked, "So how do we stop it?"

"The portal will only close once the blood is stopped...and the only way for that to happen is, um..." Giles looked very upset at this point and wished there was another way, "Gunn, the-the only way is to kill Dawn."

"No!" Angel instantly voiced his opposition to that line of thought. 

He knew how important Dawn was to Buffy. When he'd come back for Joyce's funeral, he could tell how destroyed the Slayer had been. Dawn was all she had left. "I won't go along with this. How can you even suggest that, Giles? We are not talking about this!"

"Yes, we bloody well are!" This wasn't something Giles accepted lightly. "If Glory begins the ritual ...if we can't stop her..."

"Come on. Say it. We're bloody well talking about this. Tell us to kill Buffy's sister."

"She's not in fact her sister. If the ritual starts, then every living creature in this and every other dimension imaginable will suffer unbearable torment and death...including Dawn."

"Then the last thing she'll see is us protecting her." Angel wouldn't do it, no matter how desperate they were.

"You'll fail. You'll die. We all will." 

The Scoobies were caught between a rock and a hard place. None of them wanted to kill Dawn, but it wasn't helping that they had no other choice. 

"There may be something else. Well, we have some ideas, if we could actually get Glory on the run, but, um..."

"That shield Amy put up. How do we get through it?" Cordelia said, as if she was reading Giles' mind.

"Well, the spell wasn't cast by us, so Willow and I wouldn't be able to bring it down in time to stop Glory. Only the one who cast the spell would be able to," Tara said. "I mean, look how hard it was for the Knights to get through our shield at the gas station..."

When Tara mentioned the gas station, Riley suddenly remembered something from earlier. He walked over to Giles and pulled a necklace out of his pocket, "That reminded me, Giles – I wanted to show you this earlier..."

Giles put his glasses on, and took the necklace from him. After looking it over he asked, "Where did you find this?"

"Buffy had it in her hand, after Glory knocked her out. I think she pulled it off of her during the fight..."

"Wait a second. I know what this is!" Tara voice was dripping with venom, as she looked at the object. 

"It's a slave collar for Wiccas. They used these during the Inquisition! It lets someone control a witch. If Amy's been forced to wear one of these...the pain she must go through if she doesn't follow Glory's orders would be...Goddess, I *hate* these things!" the witch snapped.

"Wait. Amy's still helping her," Cordelia said.

"She might not know Glory lost it. If we could get this to her, she could bring down the shield."

"Bring down the shield? You do know this sounds like some whack-job version of 'Return o' the Jedi', right?" Spike was just oozing sarcasm on the other side of the room. 

"I mean, how the hell can we even get in there to tell this Anna...er...whatever her name is, her leash is broken?" the chipped vampire smirked.

Angel snapped his fingers, "The sewer. That site's got to have an access point under the site! It's how I get around L.A...."

With most of them exchanging ideas, a lot of the pieces of the puzzle were coming together. Now that they had these new developments to consider, the whitehats slowly began coming up with a plan.

***

As for Willow and Buffy, it was getting hopeless. They were having no luck getting through to Xander, and time was running out for them. 

After watching Xander kill his undead soulmate, the two found themselves in a forest. It was the middle of the night, and there was a path leading to a campfire a ways in front of them. Xander was lying on the ground by the fire, staring at the night sky. 

The girls walked over, and sat on the opposite side. Since talking to Xander wasn't accomplishing anything, they waited for him to speak first.

"You know, it's so beautiful here. Yosemite National Park. I camped out here, a couple of months after I left town. It's so peaceful, it really gives you time to collect your thoughts."

"Why are you doing this, Xander? We can..."

Xander cut Willow off, ignoring her like she wasn't even there. "I made the choice to move on with my life, the first night I camped out here. But with everything that happened after that...I don't know. It wasn't worth it. So many people I cared about are gone, I just want it to end..."

Willow was almost crying, and so was Buffy. This entire time, everything they'd tried...had accomplished nothing.

Buffy realized what was happening – Xander was ignoring them.

Just like the night the Scoobies had ignored him, when he'd pleaded with them to understand his side of the story – that night the Hellmouth had almost opened.

Harvey had told her the only way to get through to him, was to give him a reason to live. So, she did the only thing she could. With tears running down her face Buffy told him, "Xander, I'm sorry!"

For just a second, Xander seemed to flinch, "What?"

"I'm sorry for everything that happened that night. We shouldn't have done that to you!"

"Buffy, you don't understand..."

Willow got up right next to him, they had an opening now and she intended to make the most of it. "Yes we do! We found out about the bomb, the week after you left. Xander, you saved everyone that night but we never got the chance to tell you, because we thought you were killed..."

"Xander, we need your help. You're not alone! What about Gunn? He's your best friend, and he would do anything for you. So would I. So would Willow. And Giles and Faith and everyone else...even Cordy! We all care about you Xander – don't do this!" Buffy told him.

"Buffy, it's more than that. A lot more. It feels like everything I touch, everyone I come in contact with...something bad happens to them. I don't want that to happen to all of you..."

As soon as he finished, Xander found himself confronting them in the boiler room again. The timer on the bomb was just passing one minute to detonation.

"Xander."

The young man turned around, and found himself face to face with Alonna. Xander looked like he was about to lose it, but Alonna just put her finger up to his lips.

"What you said, that's not true. Sweetheart, there was nothing you could've done to save me that night – so stop beating yourself up over it. You've done all you could have for these people and the others; you gave it everything you had, and that's all you could've done. It's all anyone should have to do. Don't give up now, Xander. Please."

Xander quietly walked over to the bomb, which had just a few seconds left on it. 

"I've made so many mistakes in my life..." he quietly said to himself, as the leader of the Lost Boys watched the timer count down.

7...6...5...4...3...2...*click*

Xander pulled out one of the wires, deactivating it. "...but I won't today. Goodbye Alonna, I love you."

_Angels lend me your might  
Forfeit all my lives to get just one right  
All those colors long since faded  
All our smiles all confiscated  
Never were we told  
We'd be bought and sold  
When we were innocent  
_

***

In the training room, Xander was suddenly brought back to reality. He took a couple of deep breaths, and leaned over the chair he was sitting in – while running his hands through his hair.

Buffy and Willow instantly came over to him. The three of them looked at each other for a second, and then they all hugged. For a moment, it felt like the last two years had never happened and they were still best friends. 

At least now, there was an understanding between them and it was something.

"Are you going to be able to do this?" Buffy asked Xander.

He nodded. "Yeah. Not only that, Doc told me he changed the past because we stopped Glory before. We did it once, I'm sure we can do it again."

_This prayer is for me tonight  
This far down that line and still ain't got it right  
And while confessions not yet stated  
Our next sin is contemplated  
Never did we know  
What the future would hold  
Or that we'd be bought and sold  
We were innocent  
_

***

Willow came back into the store, with most of the others surrounded around the table in the back. "I think someone wants to say hi."

As soon as she finished, Xander walked into the room. He was all right, much to the gratitude of the others.

Several of them looked visibly relived and happy he was here. Xander took a seat by Gunn, and they both did their handshake ritual. 

His best friend asked, "You gonna be able to do this?"

Xander looked very sure of himself, "I'm as ready as I'll ever be."


	10. Centennial

**Part 10: Centennial (set during BTVS season 5, 'The Gift') **

            Everyone in the Magic Box was crowded around the table as Giles addressed the gathering, "You all know what needs to be done. We have one chance at this. If we fail, the world as we know it will cease to exist. If things get desperate though, don't think of doing anything stupid. Watch out for each other, and let's hope we win this thing."

            There were thirteen of them in total. There was Buffy and the Scoobies, Angel and his crew including Lorne, and Xander's cadre of himself, Gunn and Faith. 

            "Remember, we only need to keep Glory occupied until her window of opportunity has passed," Giles finished up.

Thus, they all got up and collected weapons, or whatever else they thought might be useful. 

Buffy certainly had a huge collection to choose from. Not only that, but the Scoobies had managed to 'requisition' several tranq guns and taser blasters from the Initiative base before it had been filled in with concrete. 

Buffy went for the massive hammer in the display case on one of the shelves. It was a leftover from when Olaf the trollgod had accidentally been summoned, during an argument between Willow and Tara.

Faith was instantly jealous, "Whoa. You mind?" Buffy handed it to her, and Faith did a few practice swings. "Tell me you got two of these?"

"Sorry, Faith. It's one of a kind."

"Damn!"

"Uh, Buffy? Faith?" Giles called out.

Without even thinking Faith tossed the hammer to Angel, who suddenly realized he couldn't lift the damn thing and went crashing to the floor along with it. A couple of the Scoobies chuckled.

"Um...sorry, Angel."

Angel felt like he'd just had a hernia. "Don't worry about it," he muttered, through gritted teeth.

The two Slayers came up to Giles, "What's up, Giles?"

"With everything that's going to happen shortly, I-I feel I should tell you both that the two of you have the best chance of containing Glory. You, you need to look out for each other."

"Five-by-five," Faith nodded. "Apocalypse coming, it's no time for old grudges."

"This is how many apocalypses for us now?" Buffy asked him.

"Oh, uh, well...six, at least. Feels like a hundred."

"I've always stopped them. Always won."

"Yes."

"I sacrificed Angel to save the world. I loved him so much. But I knew...what was right. I don't have that any more. I don't understand. I don't know how to live in this world, if these are the choices. If everything just gets stripped away. I don't see the point. I just wish that...I just wish my mom was here. The spirit guide told me...that death is my gift. Guess that means a Slayer really is just a killer, after all."

"I think you're wrong about that."

"It doesn't matter. If Dawn dies, I'm done with it. I'm quitting. Faith, you can be the Slayer. I'm just so sick and tired of all this..."

Faith put her hand on Buffy's shoulder. "We all are, B. We'll get her back."

***

As Giles and the Slayers went over details for the last time, Angel confronted Spike after recovering from the literal hammer blow he'd taken. 

"Let's get one thing straight, these humans might trust you – but I still don't. Not after the torture you put me through, for the Gem of Amara."

"Oh look, Angel's bein' the big manly man now! Buffy's not watching mate, so you can give up tryin' to look studly to her," Spike just shrugged the threat off, with his usual sarcasm. 

"You think I'm joking? Drusilla's out there with Glory, so I intend on killing one of my children tonight. You so much as cough the wrong way out there, and I'll make it two."

"Yeah, right. You couldn't do it three years ago Peaches, and you couldn't do it in L.A. last year. Hell, you couldn't do it an hour ago at Doc's! So don't get on my case from now on, 'cause you might find yourself going to the woodshed instead o' me..." Spike told him, as he looked his sire right in the eyes.

"Don't test me, Spike. I don't have any qualms about dusting my offspring. I killed Darla for Buffy; you'd not even be a footnote. Remember Penn? He's pancake mix now, 'cause he tried to kill a woman I was with..."

The souled vampire glared at the blonde demon. "So just keep your priorities in order, and don't have any second thoughts about reconciling with Dru!"

***

Meanwhile, Xander and Tara were having their own conversation at the cash register.

"It just seems like...I dunno, it's strange...Tara – you know what I mean, right?"

"Um, I think...but I'm not surprised you feel that way. This is something that's been building up for two years, and now it's all coming to a head. You're trying to bring a sense of closure to all the pain and suffering you went through, because of Glory. There's nothing strange about that."

"You think so?"

"All the people involved in your problems are all here. Just remember when we're out there, that we're on your side."

"Well, huh, that kinda puts it all in perspective. You ever think of becoming a psychiatrist?"

"It's weird – you know, the psych professor at UC Sunnydale said the exact same thing! Of course, she was an evil-bitch leader of the Initiative, so I don't know how good an idea that is..."

***

The whitehats all left the Magic Box around midnight. The construction site was about half a mile away from the store, as they trooped towards it. 

The gang stopped close to a block away, to get ready for the attack. The plan they'd worked out was this: the sewer access would be an easily defended choke point, if they were caught getting everyone through. 

So Xander, Gunn, Spike and Angel would quietly come up from the sewer, find Amy and get her to reverse the protection spell. Once the shield came down, the whitehats would split up and come in from two sides.

For practical reasons, both groups had one Slayer, one Wicca and one Watcher. Buffy's job was to keep Glory at bay for as long as possible, with Faith's help if needed. The rest of them would deal with Glory's minions.

They all crowded around the manhole about a block from the site. "You guys ready for this?" Buffy asked them.

"Little courage might be nice," Xander said offhandedly. 

Spike pulled his flask out, and offered it to him. Xander shrugged, "Good enough." He took a swig, and shuddered. After that, the four men got into the sewers.

These four guys had the advantage of being the best sneaks out of all the gang. They all could come behind just about any person, and scare the living hell out of them.

"Jesus, I think that was a rat. Man, it's the size of a dog!" Of course, Gunn wasn't too happy about trudging through the sewers to get to the construction site.

"Oh, quit complaining. Ya know mate, I figured you'd be used to places like this," was Spike's reply.

"Say what?" 

"Ya heard me. Don't you live in that abandoned basement?"

"Yeah, I do. And FYI, it's clean. Doesn't smell. I think the only person here who's comfortable in the sewers is Donatello over there," Gunn looked at Angel. "No offense, man."

Angel just rolled his eyes. "You think I like this? I have to shower every time I go through a sewer!"

"Uh, guys?" Xander said.

"*And* the smell stays on my clothes. Do you know how hard it is to get that off of leather?"

"YO, GUYS!" Xander got their attention. He pointed up, "I think we're here."

"Oh, right." Angel pulled off the manhole cover, and peeked out topside. After a minute he came down and said, "Nobody's around. Makes our job easier."

The three guys followed Angel out. They were in a remote corner of the site, which was deserted since it was walled off from the street by a high wooden fence. Apparently, Glory's forces hadn't given much thought to watching that area.

"Okay, we're here. So where's this Amy at?" Gunn asked.

***

The girl in question was with Glory's minions at the other end of the site. And she wasn't too happy about the world ending, unlike the others present. 

Glory's promise of power when this was all over did nil to make her feel better. It wasn't exactly like she could fit in.

She had to stay away from Glory's servants, since they were so dirty. 'Hobbits with leprosy' was one way to describe them.

The Wicca couldn't hold a conversation with the mental patients, and all the vampires were too busy sizing her up for food.

So Amy just hung back, while all the schemers celebrated their victory. Just then, she felt a small stone hitting her in the back of the head. Amy turned around, and saw Xander Harris motioning her over from behind a large pile of barrels.

Amy quietly made her way to where Xander was, unable to believe her eyes.

"Hey, Aims. Nice dress..."

"Oh my God! Xander – you're alive? How'd you get in here?"

Xander massaged the bridge of his nose. "Should I just take out a classified ad that says 'I'm Alive', so everyone stops saying that?"

The other guys were behind Xander. Angel got Amy to focus on him, "Amy, listen to me. We need your help. We're trying to stop Glory, and we…"

"Dru," Gunn said quietly from behind Angel.

"Yeah, Gunn. We drew up a way..."

Gunn grabbed Angel's shoulder. When Angel turned around, the vampire hunter pointed to Drusilla watching them. "No. Dru!"

"You're sneaky rats. And I 'ate rats," was all Drusilla said, as Glory's army quickly surrounded the five of them. 

The rat comment infuriated Amy and she tried to tackle Drusilla once again, but Glory's servants pulled Amy back to a safe distance as the four heroes were back to back with each of them, trying to stay alert for any attacks.

Glory herself appeared a few seconds later, and started doling out insults as she made her way to the group. "Well, well. So the Slayer's sending her groupies to do the job for her! What, the blonde bitch lose her nerve? She afraid now?"

Angel nodded to Spike, while she was talking. It was something only the two of them knew, from fighting together for over 15 years in the 19th century.

Spike took the lead and started antagonizing Glory, "Oh, she'll be 'ere right soon enough. Remember what I told you, when you 'ad me strung up? The Slayer is gonna kick your skanky, lopsided ass back to whatever place would take a cheap, whorish, fashion victim ex-god like you!"

"That's it – you're dead!!" Glory advanced on them, then stopped suddenly and started wobbling. As if she was feeling weak.

Angel had a big smile on his face. He yelled, "Hey, Glory! Catch!!" 

The vampire pulled the Dagon sphere out of his pocket, and threw it at Glory. She instinctively caught it, and the initial shock from the artifact incapacitated the hellgod for a brief moment.

The mad blonde screamed in pain, as she dropped the Dagon sphere. This gave Angel a chance, and he threw the necklace to the captive witch as he yelled, "Amy! Bring it down!!"

The Wicca caught the necklace, and you had to give her credit – she instantly figured out what it was. 

With a wicked grin, Amy cast a spell that sent Glory and any other bad guy within a ten-foot radius tumbling to the ground. With Glory's minions temporarily out of the way, Amy again muttered the spell she'd done earlier, causing the shield to come down.

And thus, Glory's well-laid plan fell apart.

Like clockwork, the rest of the Scoobies stormed the site. Buffy, Willow, Wesley, Lorne and Cordelia came in from the north end, while Faith, Giles, Tara and Riley came right in from the side behind Glory's minions, to take some of the pressure off of Angel's group.

The odds, once heavily in the hellgod's favor were now even – much to her dismay.

"Hi honey, you miss me?" Buffy said, coming up to Glory.

The insane hellgod was starting to come out of the funk the Dagon Sphere had put her into, and barked out orders. "Go guard the girl. This is a...this is a, a..."

"Diversionary tactic?" her minion asked.

"Go! Guard!"

Glory then turned to Buffy. "Ya know, you be patient and try to let them understand this is how it's supposed to be…" 

The hellgod got up, and strode toward the Slayer. She stomped the Dagon Sphere into bits without even stopping, "…but you just don't seem to get the point!"

"Do you ever stop talking?" Buffy asked her with a smile. And just as Glory got close enough, the Slayer pulled the hammer out from behind her back and hit Glory full in the face.

***

The hellgod's minions, who weren't busy with the good guys, were guarding the entrance to the scaffold. "Stand fast! Kill anyone who dares approach! This will be our day of glory!"

"Well punned!" another minion exclaimed.

"Well, it just called out to me..."

An arrow suddenly hit the minion in the chest, terminating it with extreme prejudice. Wesley reloaded his crossbow, while behind him Lorne and Willow were roughly handling a few of the mental patients. 

The Host used his singing voice to hit a high note, and several of the patients screamed and covered their ears in pain. Willow used the opportunity to telekinetically throw several tools on a workbench at them, knocking them out...

***

Angel staked another vampire, but he was on the losing end of four-to-one odds. Another of them came rushing to join his comrades – but Riley, who was near Angel, grabbed him by the back of the head and used the vampire's momentum to slam him into a steel pillar. 

Half of the vampires attacking Angel broke off to help their comrade. Angel took full advantage of this priceless gift, and quickly manhandled his two remaining opponents...

***

As for Riley, he staked the vampire he knocked out. He subsequently turned to face the two coming straight at him. 

Just then, Spike came out of nowhere and leapt on top of one, letting out a battle cry and continuously punched the vampire's face in. 

Riley roughly handled the remaining bad guy with his baseball bat. But even as he admired his work, he didn't notice Drusilla sneaking up behind him. 

Dru pulled the bat out of his hand, and after a brief struggle she hit him hard in the face with it, sending Riley crashing to the ground.

***

"Just like old times, man!!" 

Xander was having the wildest thrill of his life. It'd been months since he and Gunn had fought together, in an engagement this big. The two guys were a potent team, and their opponents were soon finding that fact out.

"Heh, and my guidance counselor said I wouldn't go anywhere in life," Gunn joked as he decapitated another vampire.

***

Several of the girls had taken cover behind a pile of beams, and Faith was doing her best to cover them.

"Girls, hurry up!" Faith yelled, as she knocked out a mental patient and delivered a roundhouse kick to one of Glory's minions.

Behind her, Tara and Cordelia were tending to Amy. "Amy, you gonna be okay?" asked Cordelia.

Amy nodded her head, "I think so. I just need a minute to recover from that spell..."

"Cordelia, get to Angel or one of the others – see if they can get up to Dawn!" Tara exclaimed.

"Love to, but there's kinda the problem of..." the ex-cheerleader pointed at the two minions in her path.

"Incindere!" Tara chanted, as a flame shot up from the ground and set the minions' robes on fire. That gave her the chance she needed, and Cordy sprinted towards Angel.

***

Dawn was looking on at the carnage occurring on the ground. She was trying to tell herself Buffy and the others would save her. She thought it was going to happen now, as all of a sudden she saw a familiar face, and so her hope soared.

"You. You can help me. Untie me. Please. Help me, she's coming..."

"Well, it seems she's running a bit late, is the thing. And, uh, if her Splendidness can't be here in time to bleed you..." 

It was Doc, only this time around he had several bruises on his face from his fight with Xander. "Hey! Kid. Wanna see a trick?" the demon said, as he pulled out a knife.

***

Riley was on all fours, doing his best to get up. He was bad shape, with blood oozing out of his nose. Dru didn't give him any time to recover though, she kicked him in the ribs and hit him again with the bat across the chest. 

"Miss Edith says it's time to say goodbye!"

The insane vamp stood over him, ready for the kill. Then suddenly, much to Riley's surprise, she turned to dust. 

A second later, Spike walked into view with a stake in hand. He looked at the pile of dust that used to be Drusilla for a moment, then looked at Riley and chuckled, "Women..."

***

The only one having trouble in the fight was Giles, as he'd somehow got separated from the others. One of the minions was pressing Giles' axe against his throat, while another repeatedly hit him in the ribs.

He managed to push off the one bad guy struggling with his axe, and then buried it into the other one's chest. With several of the mental patients coming at the Watcher, he fell back to the closest Scoobies, which happened to be Spike and Riley.

Riley pulled out his tranq gun, and shot two of the mental patients as the three of them took cover behind a machine.

"Has anyone noticed we're going backwards?" Riley asked, he tried to stop the bleeding from his nose.

"It's crossed my mind," Spike told him.

"As long as...Buffy can keep Glory down...long enough, it doesn't matter. There's only a few minutes left to start the ritual. We haven't got up to Dawn, but then neither has anyone else," Giles huffed out.

Spike, being a vampire, had better eyesight than Giles. "You're wrong. Someone's up there!"

Just after Spike said that, he could hear Willow's voice in his head, "Spike, can you hear me?"

"Yeah, loud 'n clear."

"Is there someone up there with Dawn?"

"Yeah, can't tell who."

"Go. Now!"

***

By now, Willow had made it to her fellow Wiccas. Willow and Amy both put their hands out; Tara joined with them, and the three witches sent the entire enemy group guarding the scaffold to the other side of the construction site, giving Spike a clear path.

Wesley and Lorne were in awe over the event they just witnessed. "Whoa. Wes, remind me never to piss off those three."

"Yes, good idea..."

***

"Angel! Two o'clock!" Gunn yelled, as he and the vampire held off a group of crazies.

Xander was bringing up the rear, when Cordelia finally got up to the three of them. "Xander!"

"Cordy? What's wrong?"

"We need to send someone up the...oh God, not now!" the seer cried, as she grabbed her head. 

Xander caught her, just before she fell over as a vision tore through her mind. Gunn had told Xander about these occurrences, but he'd never known they were this painful to her.

"Cordy, what is it?"

After a few seconds, his ex-girlfriend became lucid again as she looked to the top of the scaffold, and Xander lowered her to the ground. "Someone's up there with Dawn!"

Xander picked up the binoculars next to him, that Angel dropped during the fighting. All the young man said was, "You..." as he looked through the binoculars – and a split second later, he was running up the scaffold.

"Xander. Xander!" Cordy tried to get back up, but the vision made her too dizzy to stop him. By the time Gunn and Angel finished off the mental patients, Xander was gone.

***

Xander was racing up the scaffold. And the adrenaline in his system was helping Xander fight off any pain or exhaustion he was feeling. 

The former Zeppo was about halfway up, when he saw Spike being thrown from the top of the scaffold. Watching that chilled Xander to the bone.

"Xander?" 

It was Willow. He could hear her voice in his head. "Willow? Did you see that?"

"Yeah. Xander, whoever's up there is about to start the ritual. None of us'll be able get there in time. Xander, you have to stop him!"

_Great. This is just perfect. It's all up to me. No pressure…Xander kept telling himself. _

***

Doc moved towards Dawn to begin the bloodletting ritual, and destroy the world.

"Shallow cuh...aaaaaggghhh!" the hellgod worshipper cried out in pain, just before he was about to cut Dawn.

Xander was behind him with his sword, and had impaled Doc on it. Without even looking back, Doc swung his arm around and knocked Xander down.

"You again?!?" Doc pulled the sword out of his stomach, and let it drop onto the beam. He pulled Xander up, and pinned his arm behind him. "Nice try, Xander. Enjoy the fall..."

The leader of the Lost Boys didn't respond. He just brought his left leg up, right into Doc's groin. 

As the demon moaned in pain, Xander started landing a few choice blows of his own.

***

Buffy and Glory were fighting each other, all over the entire site. Buffy had done a number on Glory throughout the battle, thanks to Olaf's hammer – but the hellgod stopped her, every time she tried to ascend the scaffold. 

The blonde Slayer was nervous, Dawn was up there and there wasn't anything Buffy could do to directly help her. 

Buffy felt like she was losing control of the situation. She had put her faith in her friends, and it was her job to keep Glory at bay. It was to date the best she had ever done against the hellgod.

But Dawn's fate kept eating away at Buffy, she had to at least try to get to her. 

However, Buffy's latest attempt to get to Dawn wasn't going any better. She made it to the second level, when Glory managed to throw her off to the ground below. 

The blonde girl hit the ground hard. And the first thing going through her mind when the pain subsided, was to find her hammer.

"Looks like somebody lost her toy," Glory said to her spitefully.

The insane hellgod was holding the hammer, and now felt like it was time to see how the Slayer liked it. 

Buffy was on the receiving end of a vicious swing by Glory. It barely connected, but it still hurt.

The hell-bitch followed up with another one as Buffy was getting up, but the Slayer ducked a second before it hit as Glory took out one of the scaffold's support beams.

***

Taking out that beam caused problems for Xander and Doc, at the top of the scaffold. It shook violently, causing both of them to lose their balance and fall off the beam. 

At the last second, Xander managed to grab the beam and was hanging off of it, with Doc holding onto his leg.

For a second, Xander considered just letting go. Dawn would be saved, but that would be the easy way out. 

And he hadn't come all this way, just to quit now at the end.

"Your time is up. Why can't you see that?" Doc yelled at him.

Xander just laughed, which Doc couldn't understand since he was so close to death. "I got all the time in the world, Doc. You. Don't." 

The demon suddenly realized what he meant, as the chance for the bloodletting ceremony was almost over.

As Xander was pulling himself up, Doc used his demonic reflexes to get onto the beam at almost the same time as Xander. As the human lay on the beam, the demon lunged for Dawn but Xander grabbed hold of his foot and he slammed face down into the beam. 

Doc rolled over onto his back and kicked Xander in the face, causing him to let go of the leg. Doc then frantically searched for his knife, his composure simply vanishing as he became more desperate.

And as soon as he found it, the hellgod worshipper rushed to where Dawn was.

Xander knew he had one last chance to stop him. While Doc was searching for his knife, Xander picked up his sword and ran toward the demon. 

The young man put his entire body behind his swing and decapitated Doc just before he cut Dawn, his head and body crashing to the ground below. 

It reminded Xander of the night Alonna had died – the vamp he had decapitated, and the desire to yell, 'There can be only one!'

Xander stared over the edge, and wished he could've made Doc suffer more – but knowing the monster wouldn't be able to hurt him or anyone else again, was a decent consolation prize. 

The people of Sunnydale would wake up tomorrow, and the world would still be as it was. The Scoobies had done it, the world was safe.

"Xander..." Dawn had tears streaming down her face, as she was forced to watch Spike and then Xander be put through all that. It wasn't helping her, knowing that so many people she cared about were being hurt because of her.

Xander came over to Dawn, and cut the ropes tying her up with his sword. He pulled her close, and the young girl hugged him. 

"C'mon, Dawnie, let's get you outta here..." was all he said.

***

The world was safe, but the Scoobies were still in the fight of their lives. Especially Buffy. 

The toll she'd inflicted on Glory was making the hellgod desperate, and the other blonde was not holding back at all now.

"Oh, God..." was all Buffy said, as she ducked another of Glory's swings which incidentally took out another support girder. 

The blonde Slayer was exhausted now, and didn't have the energy to do anything but avoid Glory's shots.

"Stand still, you bitch!" the other female shouted.

But what Glory didn't realize was that the scaffold was becoming dangerously unstable, with all the damage she was doing to the foundations.

"Argh!" Glory yelled, as Buffy ducked another swing and she took out yet another support beam. 

The Slayer managed to kick Glory in the stomach, and knock the hammer out of her hand. That didn't stop Glory though, and she pressed Buffy against a pillar while trying to choke her to death.

***

The scaffold had taken too much damage. A creation of crazy people, it wasn't built to withstand that kind of punishment, and it slowly tilted to the side – ready to come down.

"Oh my God," Wesley said to nobody in particular. "Everyone get back!" he then yelled.

But while the Scoobies started clearing out, Faith didn't listen and sprinted toward Buffy. The ex-con picked up the hammer when she got close enough, and slammed Glory in the back with it.

Glory slumped down in pain, as Faith put her arm around Buffy and helped her clear the scaffold.

The hellgod had physically reached her limit, and morphed back into Ben. The doctor looked around, wondering what was going on. Then he stared up, and saw the scaffold falling right at him.

"Oh, shi..." was all he got out, before a steel beam struck him in the head – killing him instantly.

***

Most of the whitehats met up near the manhole, where Angel's group had first entered the site. As the Slayers caught up to them, Buffy slumped against the equipment and asked, "Where's Dawn?"

Willow looked at the scaffold in fear. "They're still up there. Oh God, they're still up there!"

Buffy looked over at the falling tower, with a mixture of shock and fear. "Dawn! Xander!"

***

Xander and Dawn were still two storeys up, and everything around them was coming apart and collapsing. Xander held Dawn close to him, as the scaffold came crashing down.

"Dawn, hold on!"


	11. Settling Accounts

**Part 11: Settling Accounts (set after BTVS season 5, post-'The Gift') **

            The scaffold was coming apart at the seams, but Xander and Dawn were still a good 40 feet up from the ground. They couldn't descend any farther down, before the tower was starting to tip over too far.

The next few seconds seemed to take forever to Xander. He had to do something quick. Still holding to Dawn, he grabbed a pole that had detached from the main scaffold.

Between Xander and Dawn's weight and the force of Xander grabbing the pole, it started falling in the opposite direction of the scaffold. 

Xander's pole vault idea was better than jumping, but not by much. A few seconds later, they both crashed into the back of a dump truck.

All the remaining Scoobies could only watch in horror, as they saw the scaffold come crashing to the ground. As soon as the dust cleared, everyone raced toward the other side of the site toward the truck in a panic. 

Angel got there first, and climbed up the side of the truck then leaned over into the payload section. 

The whitehats nearly had heart failure, waiting for Angel to do something. But Angel came over pulling their two friends back up from the back of the truck, much to their relief.

Xander and Dawn were both covered in dirt, looking worse for wear as Angel helped them out. Dawn got to the ground, and Buffy hugged her. Both of them started crying, as soon they embraced.

Buffy was so grateful Dawn was all right. Xander jumped down next, and with tears streaming down her eyes Buffy mouthed a thank you to Xander. 

For his part, Xander was just happy it was over. As he brushed himself off, Gunn asked him, "Dude, what was you thinking doin' that?"

"Gunn, I honestly have no clue. Spur of the moment, I guess," Xander told Gunn, as he seemed to be looking at something in the distance.

"So that's it?" Cordy asked the group. "I mean, we saved Dawn and stopped Glory. Mission accomplished, right?"

***

"That damn annoying kid! We were so close this time!" 

It was Doc, or at least Doc's head. His body was about 30 feet behind him, searching for his head. Since he couldn't see the rest of him, the demon just bided his time and fumed.

"Next time I go back, I'm just killing that little bastard straight off...and the Slayer, and all her friends too! I was just too lenient on him and...what the-?" Doc stopped his ranting, after feeling some liquid being poured onto his head.

***

Xander dropped the empty bottle of lighter fluid next to Doc's head. He then walked over to where Doc could see him. 

Xander's cold demeanor made even Doc cringe. He pulled a book of matches out of his pocket and lit one, holding it right in Doc's face.

"You lose," Xander calmly told him.

The young man then tossed the match at Doc, as he turned to walk away. After a few second of agonizing screaming from Doc's head, his body slumped to the ground, finally dead. 

Xander left the site with his friends, immediately afterwards. Buffy and Gunn both held their arms around him, as they got out of there.

***

The whitehats all got back to Buffy's house around five in the morning, and just about every single one of them collapsed from exhaustion. Xander in particular slept unbroken for almost twelve hours. 

After the fight, the only thing the Scoobies wanted right now was to sleep.

But not all of them could. Giles still had a business to run, even though he'd spent most of the night helping the others. He told Tara to take the day off, because he could tell she was exhausted. 

Thankfully it was a slow day, so Giles closed early. After the Watcher locked up, he went over to the box from Doc's house that Faith and the others had brought over the previous night.

He rifled through the papers, and found the one he was looking for. It was one of the first papers he'd looked at, when he and Wesley were researching. And Giles had purposefully hidden it from his partner, after finally figuring out what it was.

The ancient text was the spell Doc had used to go back in time and change history – to destroy Xander's life.

Giles knew that if Xander discovered the document, he would be adamant in wanting to use it to fix things. Buffy and the others would probably support him too. 

Emotionally, Giles could agree with what the others would want – but intellectually the British man knew that he had to be reasonable about this. 

Things had worked out; the world had been saved, and Glory was dead. _If we changed the events of two years ago, Giles wondered, __would Glory have succeeded?_

He wasn't ready to gamble with the consequences of that action. As much as he didn't like it, Giles decided the others could never know this spell had ever existed. 

His research had showed the text to be over 10,000 years old, which meant it predated recorded history. Some people would be willing to pay him a fortune for this spell.

"No. It's just too dangerous. This must be destroyed."

Giles pulled a lighter out of his pocket, and set the parchment on fire. He dropped it into the metal trashcan, and watched Xander's chance at righting his past burn to ashes. 

"I'm sorry, Xander, I really am..."

At that point, Giles decided to make sure if Xander ever needed anything in the future, the young man could depend on his help.

***

That night the refreshed Scoobies did the only thing that came to mind, they celebrated. They had beaten the impossible odds once more, and now they could relax. Music was blaring, and the Scoobies were getting sloshed.

"Man, I never thought I'd kill my own sire," a drunk Spike told Angel, as they both sat on the couch in Buffy's house. "I mean, Drusilla drove me nuts and that floozy Harmony...God, but that was such a mistake. Angelus, you 'ave no idea about my women troubles."

"You?" Angel was just as drunk as Spike. "Not only did Dru try to kill me – again – in the last year, Faith tried to do it as well. I had a psycho cop blame me for all the crap in her life. To top it all off, Darla came back from the dead and tried to rip away my very soul! You've got women troubles?!? Man, you don't know what it's like..." Angel was almost sobbing, like people do when they get drunk.

"Ya know, mate, we don't need 'em! We can do fine just like we are! You 'n me, we're just fine like this without any nancies trying to make our lives hell. To freedom from women!" Spike held up his beer in a toast.

Angel followed suit. "Freedom from women!"

Tara and Cordelia just watched from the other side of the room. "And they wonder why I'm gay. Cordy, I'm surprised you're not upset."

"Nah. Getting to watch them heave their guts tomorrow is revenge enough..."

***

Xander was with his traveling buddies Faith and Gunn, in the kitchen.

"You really wanna do this, Xander?" Faith asked him. Gunn was just silent as he looked on.

"Yeah. I have to, ya know – if I don't, I'll be second-guessing myself for the rest of life."

Faith seemed to agree. "You wanna find your folks. Hey, I think it's a good idea." 

"Faith, you sure you don't wanna come with me?"

"I really want to, but...I dunno, I really screwed up last time I was here. I think I need to work out some issues with everyone in SunnyD, before I get on with my life."

Xander nodded, "I understand. The offer's open if you ever change your mind."

"Thanks, boy toy," she smiled and walked out, leaving Xander alone with Gunn.

"Are you gonna be okay if I leave?" Xander asked his best friend.

"It's cool, man, I can catch a ride back with Angel. So, have you told the others yet?"

"You kidding? I really suck at goodbyes. I'm just gonna leave my number. It's just easier that way."

"Bro, that just ain't right. You should tell 'em."

"I know. I know, but I've made up my mind. Like I said, it's just easier this way. There is one thing I need to take care of, though. Hey, Gunn. You're my best friend, ya know that? Thanks for being there while I was goin' through this."

"Hey, what are friends for..."

Lorne had just come into the kitchen with a mixed drink, and found who he was looking for. "Xander! I finally found you."

"What's up, Lorne?"

"Well, I was watching you two while you were butchering Stain'd in the living room a little while ago..."

"Hey, we wasn't that bad!" Gunn complained.

"Sure you weren't," Lorne deadpanned. "Xander, I read you in there and I think you should know – that your aura's changed."

"It changed?" Xander asked, not really believing Lorne.

"My guess is that Doc's little field trip really messed up what your destiny was supposed to be, and, well...your aura was blank. Now, I've never seen one of those before but I'm pretty sure what it means is that your future now, whatever happens, it's your choice. You've got one hell of an opportunity here that no one else ever has had. So make the best of it."

After contemplating that Xander told Lorne, "I will. Thanks."

***

"I just wanted to tell you I'm really sorry about what happened in the magic shop last night. I was pissed at everyone and not just you, but looking back I know it was a mistake."

Xander was sitting across from Cordelia in the dining room. He felt like at the very least he owed her an apology, after all this.

"Xander, you don't need to apologize. If anything, I should be the one saying I'm sorry. I made your life a living hell after we broke up, 'cause I was being a jilted bitch. Yes, I admit it," Cordy sarcastically flashed her award-winning smile, and they both laughed. "Finding your parents, eh? You are going to call me from time to time, right?"

"Yeah. I'll keep in touch."

"You better, or you'll just be asking for trouble!" They laughed again, as Xander and Cordelia hugged and reestablished their friendship after two long years.

***

Early the next morning, Xander was up before everybody and quietly making his way out. The only sound was somebody throwing up in the bathroom.

_It's probably Angel. He was asking for it, after drinking that much..._

Xander took one last look around, but just as he got to the door he heard someone clearing his throat behind him. He turned around and saw Giles, Willow and Buffy behind him.

"Wha-? How'd you know I'd be..."

"Gunn told us you were gonna leave early. We couldn't let you do that. Not without us saying goodbye first." Willow said, as she hugged Xander. He shook hands with Giles next, and hugged Buffy after that.

"Xander, thanks for everything. You saved Dawn. I owe you everything – again. If you ever need anything, just ask us. Please. Don't hesitate." Buffy was grateful her old friend had come back, he had saved the last of her family and she would try to pay him back somehow.

"Yes, Xander, please know we'll always be here if you need anything. We're only a phone call away."

"Thanks, guys. I appreciate it." Xander handed Buffy a note. "I was going to leave this for you. The number for my cell phone's on the bottom. Take care, guys." 

Thus, Xander got into his car and for the second time in two years, he left his own life behind.

***

Xander did have one stop to make before he left town, though. He drove over to one of the cemeteries in Sunnydale, and found what he looking for. 

It was his tombstone. Faith had told him about it, during the trip from LA. 

Xander looked at it for a long time. He would've been freaked at any other time in his life, but right now he surprisingly wasn't. The former Zeppo was still kind of in awe though, as he read the inscription.

Alexander Harris

February 14, 1981 – March 19, 1999

He saved the world

Xander smirked, "Well, twice actually, but who's counting?"

***

When he made it back to Mona, Xander found Amy waiting for him. She was standing on the other side of the car from him, and looking hopeful. "Hey."

"Uh, hi Amy. What're you doing here?"

"I overheard you talking to Cordy last night. I used a locator spell to find you, after you left."

"Why?"

"Well...most of Buffy's friends don't exactly seem to be too fond of me after I helped Glory, and since you're leaving town I was kinda wondering..." Amy picked up a backpack on the ground near her and held it up to him, while arching her eyebrow.

"But what about your dad? Isn't he here?"

"Nope. When I vanished after being turned into a rat, my dad left town. No forwarding address."

_Gee, that sounds so familiar... He shrugged, "Oh, what the hell. The car ride woulda been boring by myself anyways. Welcome aboard."_

"Awesome. So, Xander, any idea where we're going?"

"Not a clue."

"Cool."

They got into Xander's convertible, and drove off. The young man tried turning on the radio while he drove, but it wasn't working.

Amy magically waved her hand though, and the radio started playing. 

_This is gonna be interesting.  Xander thought to himself.  He smiled, listening to the lyrics from "Hero" by the Verve Pipe._

_I can't believe that it was good for anyone, to me worth the wait  
I doubt that anybody got their money's worth  
But the attention sure felt great  
With all eyes upon me, some filled with tears, some couldn't see  
It burned like a cancer when the answer did occur to me  
Creep from the cradle, but a hero's what I wanna be  
Keep it moving people cause there's nothing more for you to see  
I'm just a jerk, but a hero's what I wanna be yeah, oh yeah  
_

The End

Author's notes: I just want to say thanks to everyone who made a review or emailed about this story. Thanks to Dabear, Hullabaloo, Drake Roberts, WBH21C, Bolo, Jillian, Person, Rob Clark, Krisseth, Varthan, Malaskor, Furious George, Top Quark, Corvinus, Amelia, Skep, Wayne, Sharpe, Xand-man, Vegakeep, lwbush, Xanderluv, Calen, Phantom Dennis, Boulder, Angelic Gemma, Icewing, Hitmanhand, White Werewolf, Allison Grace, Majin Gojira, Chico Jr., Nikapi, Bobbert, Mims, Kate, Lazarus, Maggie, Jace, Jane McCartney, Obsidian, Chorlton, Lauriena, Phill, Darklight, John McCarrick, SaintMike999 and Theo. Thanks to all you guys for the comments, I don't think I would've been able to finish this without them.


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